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boss gave up on constant alignments he just pulls steer tires early and uses them on drives for the summer . It’s a better ride and more fuel efficient. Some guys pull them as soon as they notice anything and run them on trailer too . Because we use aggressive winter tires that burn off quickly in heat he likes to use half worn drives and steers in summer if they meet tread depth requirements.

 

What kind of wear?

Alignment isn't a universal solution. In fact, I had a wear issue on the right steer on the truck my son is driving. I believed it was due to loose preset bearing preload and fixed that. Still had a wobble like something was loose. I got under it with a helper turning the wheel with the truck off and could not spot it. Had it into the dealer for something else and asked them to have a look. They tried to sell me a $400 alignment, but also said both steer tires were out of round. LOL.

Said no to the alignment then took it to Goodyear and asked them to check it out. Runout was ok, but spotted and removed a bunch of old stick on weights on the right steer that had been left on (I decided to give balance beads a try). Dismounted both steers, removed the balance beads. Then carefully cleaned and greased the bead sealing area, remounted and over inflated 10% to get a good seat, and spin balanced. Problem solved. I could tell it was running right just going 30mph on the side road. I think that bunch of weights was left on from the tire change before last even.

 

It's not about the money and the government. Ohio is much better than Indiana regarding roads.
It's about empty suits, do nothing people like
Pence, who hold a power for way too long.

And Tennessee is not far behind. I was put out of service last year in North Carolina for a flat drive tire, that was actually deflated from hitting one of the large potholes on I 40 in Tennessee.

 

Tennessee is a #### shame. They used to have some of the best roads in the country. The fuel tax money and whatever other tax revenues are collected for highway maintenance actually go only to that by law, so not really sure what's going on there. In many states that fuel tax revenue and other streams that should go into roads is pilfered and wasted on pork.

 

I have been told, but don't know how true it is, that a large portion of why roads crumble so fast is down to two things. First, not having the ground leveled and smoothed well enough and giving the gravel time to settle before pouring the concrete. That makes sense to me - "we're on a deadline, so that's good enough" mentality. Or "I underbid to get the contract so I need to cut corners.

The second reason makes less sense, but I have limited experience and am working off of vicarious learning. The concrete and asphalt trucks get loaded in order and are supposed to dump in order, within a time frame. Inevitably, something goes wrong. Trucks get stacked at loading, so instead of one truck leaving every 30 minutes, now three trucks leave one right after the other. Truck B stops for a soda because he knows he'll be waiting on Truck A, but Truck C heads right in and now dumps before B, which means road section 1 cools at the correct rate, but section 2 cools slower because it has truck C's warmer asphalt, and section 3 cools faster. That makes 'seams' in-between the pours, which causes the road to crumble as traffic bounces over them. Same basic concept for other types of delays.

A final thought - we do every "efficiently " these days. Use the amount of material needed, but not any more. Think about house construction- floor joists used to be 10-12 inch centers, but now 16" is standard. Over build something, it tends to last longer, but costs a lot more.