As I mentioned before, yesterday I took my car to Les Schwab for a tire
rotation and brake inspection. When I got it back, it was pulling to
the right, and it was too late to take it back that day. Today it
wasn't raining, so I decided to do a little troubleshooting on my own.
Checked the tire pressures. They were all wrong, of course, so I
corrected them. Took the car out for a drive, and it still pulled hard
to the right. I've also got a new vibration in the steering wheel at
speeds above 60 mph.
I put my hands to the wheel vents after a freeway run, and none of the
brakes were noticably hotter than the others, so it's not a dragging brake.
At this point, I suspect I have a bad tire that wasn't as obvious when
it was on the rear. For a while I'd had an odd vibration from the rear
at certain speeds. It was a vibration at 45 mph, and at 25 mph it felt
like the rear of the car was squirming side-to-side slightly. I never
figured out what it was. I wonder if a slipped belt in one of the tires
would cause those symptoms on the rear, and a pull on the front?
At this point, the next logical step would be to swap each front tire
out with the spare, to see if the problem goes away, but that's a lot of
work and it looks like it's about to start raining again. I think I'll
take the car to the tire shop on Tuesday and let them scratch their
heads over it.
- [MBZ] Pulling to one side after tire rotation David Brodbeck
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