T14086 said:

Yeah we know...in your 4 posts you have repeated yourself! Why not tell us something else about the car even post up a picture.

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well you want to know something positive about the car. It starts in the morning and apart from the engine burning oil and having to top up every few weeks, i'm not spending more in oil than petrol so that's positive.

I have seen that there are many with the same problems as me and its right thet Fiat take the blame and sort out the problems.

By the way do you own a Croma or did you just test drive one for a week! All that i know is i didn't have all these problems with my Accord when i get back to the U.K I know what i will go back to driving, and that not the CROMA. Thats a positive thought.

Only joking the car is not a bad car at all. I would not have got it otherwise. It drives well and as I drive all over europe for work I do a lot of driving, the car feels safe its quick confortable and over all a good drive. Its a shame I have had so many problems some have been minor and other serious.

By the way fiat Italia Bologna are dealing with the engine burning oil so that will be sorted out soon.

there you go thats positive don't you think!!!!!:yum:

Regards

CAlAMATY SAM

Hi Granville thanks for this. I will phone the number in your previous post and let you know if they acknowledge their is a problem. It sounds as if the rear tracking is out so I will take it in to a performance tyre supplier near me and get them to check with their laser system. Since my original post, the rears look to be wearing faster than the fronts again so I will get the tracking checked PDQ. Hopefully it is this as at £300 for a pair of replacement rear tyres every 17K miles it hurts!

Hello Mike
There is a recall on the rear tracking so your Fiat dealer should reset it FOC.
When you phone Fiat you speak to Italy (hence the 00 infront of 0800) they will note your call and give you a number. Fiat UK will then Phone or write to you. If you insist Italy will put you through to UK but you speak to who ever is available.
Let me know how you get on.
Granville

I have had the tracking checked 2 months ago and all was well.

New Years day.
Doing 70mph on the Motorway,

Blow out on rear near side tyre,
Saw smoke in my mirror first,
Car has only done 8.500miles.

Indicated and pulled over to the hard shoulder.

Tyre was shredded on the side walls.

No marks or objects on the surface of the tyre.

Had another 250 miles to travel on the space saver tyre as no where open.

Tyre was a Bridgestone 225/45 R45 JY96.


Had the other Tyres checked when I replaced it all were ok and Tyre
pressure was ok in the others.
Be aware cost to replace was £165. Kwik Fit,
Tried several outlets.
Could have done better at my Local Fiat Dealer,
to far to travel back though.

Hi Ham

Sorry to hear about your experience, not nice.
I have not had a blow out but as many others considerable wear to the rear tyres, yes as we all know due to the tracking.
was your problem the tracking? I'm NOT an expert but it may have just been the tyre bad quality build.
I would get the Tracking checked again though as my tracking was done twicw in the space of 4 days and wes it was out the second time round.
It has beed sorted out and seems to be O.K the wear is O.K.

Let us know what Fiat Had to say.

Best of Luck.
Calamaty SAM

Granvilleb said:

Hello Mike
There is a recall on the rear tracking so your Fiat dealer should reset it FOC.
When you phone Fiat you speak to Italy (hence the 00 infront of 0800) they will note your call and give you a number. Fiat UK will then Phone or write to you. If you insist Italy will put you through to UK but you speak to who ever is available.
Let me know how you get on.
Granville

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Thanks Granvilleb

I have got on to Fiat but no JOY they insist its NOT the Tracking and won't budge!!!

Yet I'm out of pocket €600.00 for new tyres.
I'm working for a Co. In Bologna, and the dealers here are just the same as U.K.

I have seen from the FORUM that the Stilo has had the same problem and some have had major work carried out.

If Fiat are aware of these problems why don't they sort them out!!!!.

The last company I worked for here in Italy supplied Cromas as Co. Cars and 4 went back out of 10 with problems infact the rear wheel wear was one of the common problems but with Co. cars it don't matter the Co. picks up the tab.

I found out today that Fiat U.K work out of an office in Milan even when you go through to the 0800 U.K.

thanks again for advice

Have you seen the facelifted Croma in Italy? I suggest they may have done a modification on this and hope the old one will go away. This is a Fiat way of working.

Granvilleb said:

Have you seen the facelifted Croma in Italy? I suggest they may have done a modification on this and hope the old one will go away. This is a Fiat way of working.

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Not true Granvilleb !!...Theres a service news for rear suspension adjustment(if required).

my second set of tyres are wearing on one edge and feathering. My dealership says they have done the recall. Can I get a copy of the service news you mention. If not what are the details? I know Fiat and they will modify a facelift and will not modify the previous cars. It's cheaper that way.

service news bulletins are issued to registered dealerships,it is not my place to make such documents (in part or whole) public unless fiat themselves wish to do so.

Well my local dealer did admit that their is a recall (5138) and that he thought they had done it at the last service back in May. I didn't expect to have to visit the dealer this month but the ECU warning light appeared 2weeks ago with the usual loss of power (felt like 0-60 in 25 seconds!)
They had the car for 3 days and said that the tracking had been adjusted using their new laser tracking facility and that the diagnostics confirmed that the air sensor had gone and they had ordered a new 'throttle housing'. This was fitted on day 3 and I collected the car that evening. It was so low on fuel that I had to fill up before my trip home. After several short and one long trip I noticed that the fuel economy has dropped to around 36mpg (usually get 42-44) and there appears to be a lot more tyre/road noise from the rear. Tracking or badly tuned, I'm not sure but it will be back at the dealers next week for them to check. The rear tyres are at 4mm and have done 12K.

Well as many have had this problem with the rear tyres wearing and even when the tracking has been done RE-Call. It appears that some of us are still having problems with excess wear to the rears.

What is this Rear suspention adjmt. about?

I saw Granvilleb & T14086 have mentionrd a service news for rear suspension adjustment(if required).
Could this be the cause of the wear on the rear tyres???

If so has there been a re-call of how does one get their car looked at for this possible adjtmnt? :idea:

let us Know????

SAM

Hi Moderator,

Whats this "rear suspension adjustment(if required)" that you mention is this the possible cause of our tyres wearing down?

Do all dealers know about this or do they have to enquire about the service news bulletins?

let me know.

Many Thanks

Sam

CALAMATY SAM said:

Do all dealers know about this or do they have to enquire about the service news bulletins?

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they are e-maled automatically to every dealer so they should be aware assuming they read their email

T14086 said:

they are e-maled automatically to every dealer so they should be aware assuming they read their email

Click to expand...

Well I'm totally puzzled by this whole rear tyre wear issue. The numbers (see later) do not add up and my experience is at total odds with what Fiat think the problem might be.

Before we get onto the Fiat opinion, I checked with a Vauxhal dealer. This dealer admitted that Vauxhals on the Epsilon platform did have a rear tyre wear problem with Bridgestone Turanza tyres however changing to Pirelli or other make cured the problem.

I've changed my rears to Kumho Ecsta Sport KU31 - 215/50ZR17 95W XL tyres. Note the higher load rating.

Back to the facts for my Croma.

Original Fiat info said that if you had even across the tread wear then there was no issue. I had mine checked at 10,500 miles and the treads depths were, Front 4-5-4, Rear 2-4-2. These suggest mild under inflation but even across the tyre wear.

At 12K service (11,420) we had, Front 3-5-3, Rear 2-3-2.
At 11,438 I replaced the rears with the above Kumho tyres. Also raised the tyre pressures to the top end/high load figure Fiat recommend.

Basic summary (as I see it). My rear tyres wore evenly across the tread but only lasted 12K miles.

I'm not at liberty to fully disclose what is in the Fiat Product update 5138 but the basic information is that tyre wear measured from the outside/shoulder tread to inside tread/shoulder should not exceed 0.3mm per 1000 miles. A handy reference table is provided that goes up to 20,000 miles showing 6mm to be acceptable.

Now this is where I have my problem.

I've done 12K miles with 2-3-2 mm. 2 less 2 = 0. So I'm within spec but the tyres only last 12K miles with EVEN ACROSS THE TREAD wear.

Also, given the accepted 0.3mm per 1K miles (6mm in 20K miles) limits this would suggest that with an 8mm new tread and 1.6mm legal limit rear tyres are not expected to last more than 20K miles.

Based on what I have on my car, I have no tracking or camber issues, have even across the tread tyre wear BUT the rubber wear rate is about 0.5mm per 1000 miles. I would noramlly expect rear tyres to last 35K+ miles. This is about 0.2mm per 1000 miles.

So I'm looking for what is actually really going on here. As my rear tyres are brand new any Fiat dealer can not really apply/measure the campaign critera. I've only done about 1K miles and measuring 0.3mm of wear reliably and accurately is IMHO (based on years of experience) not possible with any real degree of confidence. However in a few more thousand miles I should be able to more reliably measure tyre wear. I have the full campaign alignment figures and plan to visit a computerised laser full four wheel alignement system (such a used by Michelle Dever Tyres) for a full 4 wheel alignment measurement which I will compare with Fiats figures.

In the meantime everything does NOT stack up. If someone/anyone can explain then I'm listening.

Nick /////

Nick
I believe you are on the right tack with the tyre spec. The Croma was homologated with 205/55/16/93w with the 215/50/17/91w and 18 wheels as options.
If Fiat would just say we should use a higher speed and/or load rating I would be happy. I just want Fiat to admit they have a problem.
Having said that the towbar load is only 70kg which is low for a car of this size. I would have expected 75kg. So the backend must be load critical.
I look forward to your experiment results.
Granville

T14086 said:

they are e-maled automatically to every dealer so they should be aware assuming they read their email

Click to expand...

I have been to my local Fiat dealer hete in Italy he checkd the e-mails and said that there was only a news bulletin regarding the Tracking NOT the rear suspension adjustment, the dealer showed me the e-mail he keeps them all in a folder.

He insisted that there is nothing to be done the the read suspension. Having said this my tyres rear and front are feathering externally, so is it the tracking or does as you mention, the "rear suspension needs adjustment".
My local Fiat dealer does not have the machines to carry out the tracking so he sends all work out to a local garage.

I will find a Fiat dealer that does tracking in house and mention this "rear suspension adjustment".

Any one else been told differently about the Tracking or rear suspension adjustment????

I think this needs to be sorted out as Granvilleb mentioned he "just want Fiat to admit they have a problem" and come up with a solution for all of us that are FORKING out time and money on Tracking and tyres like never before!!!!

Well here is some data for you all to mull over.
This data is for the 1.9 JTD 16V, 150 Eleganze model, manual.
Data is for rear wheel allignment ONLY and comes from three sources as indicated.

Standard 0 = vehicle unladed & 8 litres of fuel
Standard A = vehicle unladed & full tank of fuel

1) Fiat Croma Workshop Manual - Jan 2006 - P/N:60448552

Standard 0: Rear Toe-In: +0.0mm to +2.4mm
Standard A: Rear Toe-In: +0.3mm to +2.7mm

Standard 0: Rear Camber: -1.3 deg. +/- 0.5 deg
Standard A: Rear Camber: -1.5 deg. +/- 0.5 deg

2) Fiat Service News 44.10.06 - Inlcuded with Product Update 5138

Standard 0: Rear Toe-In: +0.3mm +/- 1.2mm
Standard A: Rear Toe-In: +1.1mm +/- 1.2mm

Standard 0: Rear Camber: -1.4 deg. +/- 0.3 deg
Standard A: Rear Camber: -1.6 deg. +/- 0.3 deg

3) Protyre 4 Wheel Laser Alignment System

Rear Toe-In: +0.1 deg. +/- 0.05 deg. (+1.66mm +/- 0.75mm)**
Rear Camber: -1.5 deg. +/- 0.50 deg.

** coverted from deg. to mm for 17 inch rims - suggest you verify the maths

Now these are the measurements for my Croma on Protyre kit

Rear Left Toe-In: +0.45 deg. (+3.39mm)
Rear Left Camber: -2.4 deg.
Rear Right Toe-In: +0.05 deg. (+0.38mm)
Rear Right Camber: -2.6 deg.

Basically all but rear right toe are out of spec. The Rear Left toe I'm suspcious about as this is way out but I see no evidence of edge wear. I did gently clip a curb when turning with this wheel the other day so I could have knocked it out then.

Finally.

These are my rear tyres tread depths for Kumho Ecsta Sport KU31 - 215/50ZR17 95W XL tyres.

These are taken from outer edge to inner edge across full width of tyre.

Left Rear: 6.0 6.0 7.0 7.6 7.6 7.0 6.0 6.0
Right Rear: 6.0 6.0 7.0 7.6 7.6 7.0 6.0 6.0

The tyres have done 1800 miles. Say 2000 miles. If the wear continues at the current rate then I'll need new rear tyres by 12K miles again.

Notice how there is even tyre wear across the tyre but because the center of the tyres are wearing less this would suggest under inflaton. This is what I concluded for my last set of tyres so these a inflated to max load pressures. Fronts did/do the same.

In my cars case of excessive negative camber AND toe-in then this could account for/explain the uniform outer edge wear. Insides wearing due to the negative camber. Outsides wearing due to toe-in.

Enjoy!

Nick /////

Need some hints/info from the moderator as he appears to be a Fiat man in the trade

Fiat say that the bolts that are used for the track & suspension arms are STRESS bolts an must be replaced.

I note that Product Update 5138 lists only two bolts and two nuts that are required to be replaced. (51798591 & 517484744 respectively). However adjusting the rear geometry requires both rear crossmember and rear track control arms to be adjusted. This requires four bolts and nuts to be replaced!

Oddly, speaking to Protyre (part of the Micheldever Tyre Group) they, when adjusting Vauxhalls (also on the Epsilon setup) do not and have not been instructed to replace bolts. The computerised system of instructions for every car model does not indicate/require bolt replacement on the the Vauxhall or Saab 93 adjustments!

What gives. This is all very confusing. Fiat say replace but only list two bolts when four would be required. Others say no new bolts required.

What do you as a Fiat dealer do?

I'm used to Fiat "over the top" instructions, like setting a TDC sensor by removing the cylinder head

Any views/opinions appreciated.

Nick /////

Hi Nick
I have two letters from Fiat telling me my tyres wear is caused by towing a caravan. The last letter was from their MD.
So would you say the 95W tyres are wearing the same as the std tyres?
Granville