badger15

Hey guys, I bought my Boxster about a month and a half ago and for some reason never checked how even the tire wear was, just stuck my finger in the middle and checked tread. After looking at them today, I noticed that the inside of the tire is worn all the way down. I've attached a picture to show you. Is this a camber issue? Do you think these tires are salvageable for a little while longer if I have them rotated and aligned? The front tires do not show the same uneven wear. Thanks for your advice!

dennisafrompa

...more likely a toe issue, but I'd definitley find a trusted alignment shop.

I've had my car set up for AX with whatever neg camber i can get with ROW M030 and zero toe infront.

The rear as I recall has some slight toe in and about a degree and 3/4 neg camber.

In 64K miles I've had NO uneven tire wear....

Turboflyer

The wear is indicative of camber. Exexcessive toe in would also cause cupping or scrubbing and I don't see any from the photo. From what I do see it appears these may be old tires. The rubber looks like it is cracking a bit in between the tread, whats left that is. You can not just rotate. Different size front and read. What you could do is have the tires removed and remounted on the opposite rim. Kind of a judgment call since the tire is only as good as its weakest part. If it is a grocery getter well maybe. I wouldn't do any high speed driving. Just not worth the damage to rim , car or worse should it let go.

Wildcat05

I had the same problem. Took it into the shop and the toe was off. Problem solved.

THXBABE

From what I have been told by the guy who takes care of my car, inner tire wear is not uncommon. He warned me the insides will wear a bit more than the outsides and I will likely go through two sets of rears for each set of fronts.

When I bought my car, the rears were in similar condition, and the fronts were in great shape. I bought 4 new tires, had it aligned to factory spec and so far so good.

Macster

you can get some more life out of tires. First set of tires, from new, managed to get quite a few miles out of tires.

What happened is I think when took car in for RMS at around 26,000 miles alignment off after I received car back. Car probably moved with stiffener removed for RMS. Afterwards tire wear concentrated to inner edges. So much so that belts were showing when I finally replaced tires. Thought this inner edge wear normal until I got printout from alignment. Rear toe-in adjustment out of spec. After alignment tire wear much more even, very even in fact.

If car steering/handling ok save alignment when you replace rear tires.

In the couple of cases where extreme inner edge rear tire wear present before and after alignment numbers clearly show rear toe-in to be the setting most out of spec.

In one case rear camber at neg. max. allowed but alignment shop told me that it would not affect handling/steering, or even tire wear (big concern since I was having alignment checked just after having shop mount new tires).

Shop advised me to save my money and drive car with rear camber as it was. I left rear camber where it was and sure enough tire wear even and handling behavior unaffected.

For street driving -- my only driving experience with my Boxster -- is rear (and front) tire wear even, or should be even if alignment correct, across tread face.

However, not unusual for right rear tire (in USA anyhow) to wear a bit more than left rear. Arises from lack of LSD and from USA driving on right hand side of roads. Affected too by how agressive, or not, driver is in turning corners. Gas car out of right hand corner frequently and right rear tire wear will be accelerated.

When you get new tires installed -- just the two rear ones or a set of fronts and rears -- then have alignment done by qualified shop. Get before and after printouts.

Remember to remove junk (weight) from car. Leave spare tire, jack, tool kit in trunk, fill up gas tank, but remove other junk in car, if any.

Sincerely,

Macster.

Edgy01

Welcome to Porsche. You must be new to Porsche or you wouldn't be asking this question. In order to extract high performance handling from these cars Porsche sets the rear suspension with quite a bit of negative camber. As you have been advised, this translates to a wear factor of two times the rears to one front tire,--and the wear is always dramatically on the inside of the wheel. That's always the FIRST place to look for tire age.

Turboflyer

Not sure about "quite a bit of negative camber" An 04 Honda Pilot has 30' and an 01 Boxster S has 1 degree as the optimum factory setting. So 7 tenths of a degree does not seem like a lot. Rear tires on any sports car or motorcycle will wear two to one. There would be some inner tire tread wear above outer tire wear, however it should not be so extreme that in and of it self it is the only cause for tire replacement. I would think the delta should be closer to mid tread. If the wear is so sever that one or two inches are worn to an unsafe depth on a non-track car then there is an alignment problem or personal preference .