Tread wear on steers really bad - chewing outsides

Those pre 05 volvos had plenty of front tire wear problems related to the trucks design. Volvo moved the front axle forward and moved the fuel tanks rearward on their later models to help solve the problem. The dealers love to blame the tires...

 

My Pete 379 does the same thing even after all the front end work done,(kingpin,new shocks.alignment etc) one old timer told me that regardles tire brand, tires will have so called radial pull,like the before mensioned when I rotaed the tires it did stop pulling to the rite but there is no kure for the wear on the outside.I will put new tires when the time comes and make sure it is mounted thru.

 

My PETES have never worn the edges of the tires...I think that. radial pull is just just popular myth...

A tire with a solid shoulder will show edge wear... one with a decoupler groove like an XZA 3 shouldn't. ..

 

One thing to look at on tires is whether or not they are worn flat accross the tire face. If the tire gets worn to a slanted angle accross the face of the tread, then the tire will pull to the low side of that tread.

Radial pull is a catch-all term. It stems from the days when radials were first made and they ran ran the belts across the tread at an angle with all the belts facing the same way. Now the belts crisscross so that problem is not supposed to happen. Many times a pull is really a result of strong camber and or caster turning the tire to the weaker side as the truck goes down the road.

 

Just a thought, but maybe check and make sure that your steering box is centered.
I fought with my truck for years trying to figure out why it pulled so badly to the right and chewed tires.
Had the toe set at a local tire shop.
Rotated the tires
Double checked and re-set the toe myself.
Everything seemed fine, but nothing worked. Finally one day it dawned on me to check the steering box for center. Sure enough it was off. Adjusted the drag link to correct it and it's been like driving a new truck.
May not be your issue, but it's worth a look.
Good luck
Floyd

 

DO IT! that is probably going to be most of your problem right there.

Think about it this way, in a race car that runs on an oval track you put taller stiffer springs on the right side along with taller tires to make it go around the track easier.

The same thing is happening to the truck you are trying to drive in a straight line. With the extra pressure on the bag it is pushing harder on one side than the other, and this is causing wear on your tire because it is constantly experincing this condition.

As well, rotate your tires side to side every time you have your oil changed, it is well worth it. I started doing it and started getting an extra 30-40,000 miles out of my steers, I was running Michelin XZA3's

I had something similar happen on my truck, it turned out to be a broken leaf. The leaf had a hairline crack through it so you couldnt really see it unless you looked close. If I didnt keep my truck as clean as I did I would not have been able to spot it.

As stated tire pressure is very important as well, and never ever and I mean never excede the number stamped on the sidewall. Trust me when I tell you that you dont want a steer tire coming apart on you at speed. Expecially if it is while you are coming off a hill.

 

What was the reason behind replacing the airbags? Put the second valve and and get it set to the right height.

 

Make sure that the height is set to 7 and 7/8 of an inch on both sides or you'll twist the axle