I finally bit the bullet and bought a new '06 F150 Lariat Screw 4x4 right before Christmas. It was one of the few remaining 06's that I had any interest in in the area and ended up placing a deposit on it so they would hold it until I could get to the dealership and test drive it. My wife and I liked the truck very much after driving with the lone exception being that it shook like a cattle cart at all speeds. After returning from the test drive I informed the salesman that I wasn't interested in the truck unless they could resolve the shaking issue. Salesman informed that he would drive it to see for himself what the issue was. Well of course it shook for him as well. He informed that it was due to flat spots on the tires caused by the truck sitting in place on the lot for so long. He assured us that it would work itself out after about 500 miles of driving as the tires would heat up and re-expand to a round state. When I asked what they would do if that didn't happen he informed they would replace the entire set of tires after 500-600 miles if it wasn't completely gone to my satisfaction. Well, after about 300 miles the shaking had improved but wasn't gone and was still annoying so I knew I'd be calling to attempt to get the tires replaced. I ended up leaving the truck parked for 6 days at the airport while we were out of town and after sitting the truck again shook like a cattle cart for another 30-40 miles and then decreased again. I called to scheduled replacement of the tires and of course was told that they wouldn't replace the tires until they had at least attempted to re-balance and rotate them and I had driven on them more. I haven't been able to take it in for service yet but I'm not convinced that balancing is going to be the answer since the tires seem to go back to their originally bad state or flat spot again after sitting for several days. Granted I'm not too happy since 3 folks at the dealership assured me that they would replace the tires no questions asked if the shaking didn't go away. They never said they would attempt to balance/rotate the tires and hope it went away or I lost interest.

My questions are:
1) Will the tires ever be "normal" again or will they constantly have flat spots?
2) Since the problem reappears after sitting, will balancing them really be a long term fix? I don't want to be going back constantly for balancing and further arguments on the issue.
3) Will the constant shaking have any detrimental effects on anything else? i.e alignment, tire wear, brakes....etc?

Tires are Goodyear Wrangler AT/S 275/65/18's if it matters.

Thanks for reading

 

All tires will flat spot after sitting for a while, even overnight. Especially in cold weather. That being said, I have never had a tire that didn't get rid of the flat spot within a couple of miles, not hundreds. And I have the same tires as you do.

 

depends on the severity of the shake, but i would think that it isnt as bad as it could be, and i wouldnt worry about damage to the truck

But yes dealership needs to be replacing your tires. other thing you could try is putting them up to 60psi drive around for 20 minutes, then return to normal PSI and see if that helps them out

 

Max on those tires is 50, I wouldn't put them up to 60.

 

yah that rating is for how much pressure it can sustain tire integrety for extended highway use at max speed. Basically the highest it should be when its running as hot as it can.

20 minutes of city driving will not over heat your tires. And i personally have put a tire up to 80psi just to get the bead to seat.
-Patrick

 

There is a difference though. When you put 80 in there it was for about 30 seconds. You also did not have the weight of the truck on the tire. I have heard of belt separation with too much air, even for short periods. Steel does not stretch like rubber/nylon.

farmerbw, as far as your tires, they should not still be causing vibration. Make them find out the real reason, whether it is 1 or more tires causing the problem. Just one bad tire can make god awful vibrations.

 

Thanks to everyone for the replies. I guess I'm going to have to take the truck in and see what the dealership is going to do to resolve the problem and go from there. Maybe once I get it there and actually talk to one of the service guys instead of the salesman they'll have a better plan that I'll like more. I'll let everyone know what shakes out.

Thanks.

 

What's really sad is you have the Wrangler AT/S tires. These are by far the best OEM tires that Ford offers. Just don't let them talk you into a set of the other POS OEM tires that Ford installs.

 

Yeah, they were actually a $325 "option" according to the sticker so I had already considered that they might try to replace with a cheaper tire to save some cash. Thanks for the reminder though.

 

Well, took the truck in on Thur for them to check the tires and do some minor paint stuff. Of course as expected they told me they weren't going to replace the tires until they'd had a chance to attempt to rebalance and rotate them..., never told me they would just replace after 500-600 miles if the shake wasn't gone....blah, blah...
They ended up replacing both drivers side tires due to "Road Force being too high on old tires". Didn't appear that they did anything to the passenger side tires at all as the weights don't appear to have been moved. Needless to say after putting about 50 miles on the new combination I can't really tell any difference or improvement over the original 2 driver side tires. I'll be calling them back and see what type of story I'll get this time! :-)

 

Man, that sux!

 

Well, took the truck back in on Fri to try one more time to fix this. After about 2 hrs they informed me that the 2 tires they hadn't replaced on the previous visit hadn't been checked or balanced. They balanced the 2 old tires and rotated all 4 so that the 2 new tires weren't on the same side. Service writer told me that the tech told her that it "couldn't ride any smoother". When I left the ride was obviously much better and after putting about 60 miles on the current set up it seems they may have finally fixed the problem after 2 tries. The only shaking I'm feeling now is from bad roads, granted it seems the tires ride is a bit stiff but at least now I can tell it's from the road and not the tires.

Thnx again to everyone that offered assistance!

 

Glad you got it worked out.