Check it out, my suspension is eating up my MTR's, Whats the deal???? I fixed my sway bar and installed a new steering column now after a 600 mile run towing the 5th steering is staring too eat away at my tires. I noticed the wheel has began to lose center and it's still a little loose up front, but much tighter than before with the worn steering column bearings and broken sway bar bracket. a 600 mile run should'nt have ate away that much tread on the inside of that tire. It also loosk like the endlinks (I think) are showing clean threads like they have backed themselves loose. I don't know what do you guys think?
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Check your ball joints, wheel bearings, and alignment.

 

Yeah definitely need to get the front up on jack stands and have a look at those items. Wierd how I fix two steering and suspension issues and things just got uglier. Is it even possible for the end links to back out while driving???

 

Tires develop a wear pattern because of how a suspension is set up. If those tolerances are changed (steering column, and sway bar brkts) and the suspension becomes tighter, or looser, then a new wear pattern develops, and the tires go bye-bye much quicker.

 

Makes Sense, so its alignment rack time???

 

Yep, its alignment time, BUT, Realize that youre about to change the wear pattern again, and you may see a little more quick wear, but then once the wear pattern is established you will be good to go.
Always get an alignment when you get new tires. have the alignment tech print out what the alignment rack shows your angles to be before and after the work. Most shops will check your alignment for free, but if it is out of spec they expect you to pay them to bring it back in spec. The great thing about a Super Duty is that once you get it in spec, it usually stays there. In 10 years of owning my truck it has only been aligned three times. It has been checked 20+ times, but they have only had to turn a wrench on it 3 times.

Something else I have learned is that you will see faster front tire wear if your truck does not sit level when loaded with your 5er. If you drive nose high there is less weight on the front axle, and the pavement acts like sand paper on your tires.

 

Great advice (like always) I should've named this thread fifth towing 101, because this is my first 5th and first trip towing it. So check this out, I was driving around looking for an alignment shop and this happened. WTF???

 

Didn't we just see the same thing, except the left side, a couple of weeks ago?

 

the one on the left side a few weeks ago was a failure at the ball and socket... this one looks like maybe that clamp was left loose or something? I can't see too well in the pics, but it appears to have backed out in his first pics and then finally come all the way out here.

 

Man Bill, thats not good. My truck goes in for inspection this month 09-~10 and I'm having ALL the suspension and steering components checked, I don't care how much it cost. Thank goodness you weren't flying.. In that last pic, are the threads stripped??

 

Looks to me like the clamp was left loose and over time it ate at the threads and pulled them clean off. That and on the inside of the tire it looks like it may be rubbing on something at full lock; that's a lot of stress if it is binding up. I don't know if these things have steering stops on the knuckle but they need adjusted if they do.

 

Not sure if it is from before or after the link coming apart but it looks like something is contacting the front diff cover too. The inside of the tire looks like rub at full lock like Keith said.

 

I guess we now know why your tires were wearing funny.

That's one heckuva' way to find out, though!

Pop

 

So I pulled the adjusting coupling and the threads are'nt stripped. They bolts were not exactly tight, not loose either just 20 lbs of torque roughly. The front tire were off and balanced two weeks ago, no signs of rubbing then. everything seemed to begin to go south about the last 100 miles. Tommorow I'll get her up on jack stands and see what I can figure out.

 

Could you turn that arm inside the collar when the nuts were "tight". I put mine on with a damn impact and I can ASSURE you they need to be tighter than 20 ft-lbs. In fact, I just looked it up for you, spec is 41 ftlbs. Problem is that even though the nuts appear "tight" they aren't tight enough to crush the collar and hold that rod from spinnning in the sleeve. If it was tightened properly I don't see how the hell it could come out.

At this point I would replace the collar anyway and check the threads on the rod very carefully for any problems. Replace as necessary.