Alright here is the stripped down version:

-When I bought my truck with 9600 mi the outsides of the front tires were flaired, the dealer told me to rotate and that would fix it, so I did.

-Then a few months later, about 14000 mi, the good formerly rear tires, now on the front, flaired so they did the star washer fix and alignment, and at this time I also had all the tires rebalanced with the weights put only on the inside some where else.

-A few months after that, 18000 mi, the passenger front tires inside tread block completely wore smooth, so I did the good washer fix from JLP's guy, Roush cam bolts and an alignment that the guy told me was as close as he could get to Speedin Bobs Lightning owners preferred specs.
The numbers Bob gave were:
LH Caster 6.7 RH Caster 7.2
LH Camber -0.5 RH Camber -0.5
LH Toe -0.05 RH Toe -0.05

The Guy at the shop said he worked for over 2 hours and came up with:
LH Caster 6.5 RH Caster 7.6
LH Camber -0.7 RH Camber -0.4
LH Toe -0.05 RH Toe -0.04

He said that he did not agree with Bobs Caster specs and that he focused on trying to get the Toe as close as possible. Then I rotated the back tires to the front again since they were now straightened out.

-Now, a few months later, 20000 mi, my truck is wearing the inside tread block off of BOTH front tires with the passenger the worst, almost smooth, and the driver is flairing on the inside block causing bad wear and noise and vibration from the tire into the cab of the truck . I took it back to the alignment shop and the guy says it is a defect in the tires and the fact that the tires are so wide and that goodyears are too soft and so they will wear bad .

I have two new goodyears in the garage to replace the two bad ones from before, but now I don't want to put them on until this is fixed and I will probably have to buy two more new tires to replace the bad ones that are wearing funny on the front again. Please help me figure out what is going wrong, it seems like the front end has not been right since the truck was built.

Thanx,
Bill

 

Maddening isn't it?!! I just wasted two Nitto tires ($350) in less than 3k miles after it supposedly was aligned. I think you have the right parts to do the job. You just need to find a shop that can put it close to specs and CRANK everything down. I know it can be done. I put 15k on my original f-1's with a near normal wear pattern.

Mark

 

With almost 1 degree of negative camber on the
drivers side I would almost expect that the inside
tread blocks would wear away. Unless you road
race your truck, I think the regular specs call for
a half degree of camber. (I'm doing this from memory)

Both of the "racing" trucks in town here have the
same propensity to scrub the inside. But we burn
through a set of tires in 10K so it isn't quite as
important. I would try to find a shop that would
guarantee the alignement and then check it often.

Good Luck ...

Cliff


PS ... Looked up the Lightning Specs ...

L.H. Caster: 6.9, +/- 1.0 Deg.
R.H. Caster: 7.4, +/- 1.0 Deg.
L.H. Camber: -0.5, +/- 0.7 Deg.
R.H. Camber: -0.5, +/- 0.7 Deg.
L.H. Toe: -0.05, +/- 0.15
R.H. Toe: -0.05, +/- 0.15

 

Same problems after I dropped the front 1". Go to a Ford dealership that warrants for 12,000 miles and work till it's right. The last time I went, he had to overcompensate as the readings changed when on the road for some reason. Basically, the springs were giving false readings or something like that when on the machine. It is frustrating. They tried to say some chit like the unloading from launch when racing was the culprit
Yea right. Good luck Oh yea, the first "Big O Tires" I used fed me the same song and dance about the wide tires and backed out on the warrenty. I was thrilled.

BD

 

You've done everything you can other than not flogging the L around corners, etc.

It's the shop. You need to find someone else. I'm on my 3rd set of F1's, 25k on each of the first 2 sets. I didn't rotate the first set enough and got the inside tread wear. The second set I rotated every 5000-7000 mi. and got a Hunter machine balance when I put them on. No alignment because when it was checked it was in spec. No inside wear on the second set.

 

Most likely, no 2 alignments are the same but here are my actual alignment specs.
Mine was lowered and aligned about 2 1/2 years ago, 20,000 miles to date and my tires wear very evenly.



My F150online Photo Gallery.....My Modifications


Hello, my name is Dave and I am an "L"coholic!

 

remeber that once the tires have a funny wear pattern in them, it will stay there and wear that way. putting the new tires on will solve your problem.
this happened on my cobra when I first got it. had it aligned and it drove straight yet the tires still wore. new tires did the trick, and it has been good since 1996.

 

I dunno what's up with the F1's but I had problems on my first set FOREVER. Got a new set installed, aligned to factory specs, and things have been great ever since.

The truck used to pull pretty bad on the highway, now it rides as straight as an arrow.

 

IF YOUR LOOKING TO MAKE THEM WEAR BETTER DROP THE CASTER TO 1 DEG. BELOW SPEC
I WORK FOR MERCEDES- BENZ ITS A COMMON PROBLEM ON
OUR S-CLASS MOSTLY DUE TO VEHICLE WEIGHT

 

Thanx for the help guys, it sounds like i need to find a new shop, get the alignment closer to the ford specs, put the new tires on, and pray. Hey SVT_KY, did you mean the caster needs to be .5 of a degree? I may not be following you on that. Does anybody know of a chain alignment shop that guarantees alignments, this was done at a single owner shop that I was told was supposedly a good place to go.

thanx again,
Bill

 

I'm new to Lightnings but unless there is something about their front end (or weight as suggested by mikes2lights) I would think the closer to "0" camber the better, especially with the wide tires, probably about 0 on the right and maybe .2 neg on the left. My 2 cents. I would agree that with these wide tires, that once worn on one edge, they will keep wearing the same pattern after alighnment. I think narrow tires will somewhat self correct after alighnment, but with wide tires on a heavy vehicle, the unworn shoulder just can't carry all of the weight thrown on it by the moment on it - especially on the inside with the inside offset of the wheels. Probably going to have to install new tires.

 

YOU SHOULD TRY TO FIND A SVT CERTIFIED DEALER
MAKE SURE YOU TALK TO THE TECHNICIAN IN PERSON
HE WILL KNOW HOW TO SET IT UP BEST

MOST SIDE SHOPS JUST TRY TO MAKE THE CARS GO STRAIT
SET THE TOE AND GET CAMBER AS CLOSE AS POSS
AND YES YOUR CURRENT SPECS WOULD WEAR THE TIRES
LESS CAMBER AND LESS CASTER
UNLESS YOU RACE ON A ROAD COARSE

 

Camber ... the angle the tire makes to a perpendicular
line.

Your lightning is now like this /-----\ and ideally
should be |------|. The reason they recommend
the negative camber is to help with the push steer
that this HOG of a truck has a tendency for. If you
lower the truck, you just make things worse for wear.

I would do the Clunk Washer repair, the Cam Bolts
that can hold a position (FORD or Roush) and then
correct the torsion arm links to the neutral position
and go find a good alignment person.

 

After making my post yesterday I got curious and got my rim mounted caster/camber gage out and put it on my 03L that just turned 1000 miles. It read out 1 3/8 neg camber on the pass side and 1 1/4 neg camber on the driver side. These are right on the ragged edge of the factory specs quoted above but way too much negative camber in my mind for these tires. Wonder if the dealer will argue about it if I haul it in there and ask them to check the alighnment under warranty??

 

Guess I also should have noted that I installed 3 inch drop shackles in the rear for a 2 inch drop. Can't see how that could affect the front alighnment except for a minor increase in caster but wonder if the dealer will argue about it??