dallison28

my rear tires are a little feathered or cupped.
The passenger rear inside tread is worn and the tire needs to be replaced. The tread is a little feathered or cupped.

The driver side is worn pretty evenly, but the inside part of the tread is just a little worn. The driver side is a little cupped or feathered also.

Now, i know that on fwd cars when you have cupped tires, it typically will be the struts.

Is it possible that the car just needs an alignment, or do the struts need to be replaced?

arenared

Cupped or feathered? Which one? How many miles on your car?

dallison28

almost 53k, it looks more like feathered. I had a set of tires cup on my dd b/f i replaced the struts. So, this looks different.

insite

feathered is usually excess toe. cupped is usually a poor tread design & is inherent to the tire.

arenared

With feathering, it's alignment, and like insite says, usually excess toe. Even with more moderate toe, you can still get some feathering, to which some tread patterns seem to be more susceptible. What I do, if you are happy with your toe and still getting some light feathering, is to run the tires backwards (swap left-to-right) usually during the summer months (for directional tires) to even out the wear.

53K, your struts should be still half-way decent.

dallison28

I would reverse them, but my inspection is due and the wear on the inside of the one tire is well below the wear mark and will not pass inspection.

I am going to get a pair of firestone firehawk wide ovals and get an alignment done also.

arenared

If you have excessive wear on the inside, you may consider cutting back on your camber. One caution is that getting "an alignment done" is a bit of a misnomer. The Porsche specs are so wide, that being "in alignment" doesn't mean much. Part of the reason is that Boxsters are adjustable for a fairly wide range of uses/preferences.