So there is this light (slowly getting louder) vibration start happening to my car at 50+mph, and it pulls to the right slightly...My firs thought is alignment right? So, I take it to get aligned, and the shop says it was a little off, they fixed it and the pulling to the right ceased, but its still vibrating and making this repetitive light oscillating thump. The shop, Merchant's Tire says my inner tire walls are chunking/wearing and its because I need new shocks/struts. I only have 59k miles on the car... Has anyone ever heard of that at 59k miles?? I had an Eclipse for 120k miles and NEVER got new suspension components at all...I just got these tires, Bridgestone Potenza 019 Grid's like a year ago, they were expensive, and now the inside is ruined. They tell me even replacing the shocks now wouldnt stop the noise, I would need new tires and struts for it to go away. Is this guy crazy, or is this legit?

 

its possible, unfortunatly just because its expensive does not means its good, the perilli tires are another example of that. if you smashed into some potholes and managed not to pop a tire then bent suspension is possible, other than that they are blowing smoke, id say get some tires because you need them anyway and see if that fixes the problem. think about what they are saying, why would you need shocks if the noise is oscillation, last time i checked suspension components dont move in a circle, sounds a little iffy to me.

 

Ok, So I looked online, found 50+ defect claims of unexplained tire wall bubbles. Also found a handful of claims saying after ~15-20k of normal treadwear, Potenzas have shown excessive irregular inner tread wear. Two shops alignment machines show my alignment is and was within factory spec range from when I bought the tires in Feb 2009 through ... See MoreThis June 2010.

I also found out that my warranty is free replacement within 3 years, pro rated replacement from 3 to 5 years based on treadwear. Firestone charged me a pro rated rate for a replacement tire under warrant in March 2009, 13 months after purchase = Refund ASAP.

The firestone guy also said it could be due to hard driving. Fortunately my progressive Myrate device has data records of my driving history of every trip since 9 months ago, showing that my averages peed of 27 mph with Zero hard brakes per trip, is less than the avg MD driver of 35mph with 4 hard stops per trip, also giving me a 13% discount on insurance. Long story short, the Firestone Manager is going to have a horrible day tomorrow

 

nice job, i hope replacing your tires fixes your problem, dont forget to write a horrible review on that tire distributor and make sure to pin it all on the manager, trust me they listen.