Uneven Tyre Wear - a Fiat thing ??

Called in to have a puncture mended today - (screw through the tyre).

At 25,000 miles now and had also noticed that the inner tread was wearing more than the outer on the fronts although it still had 4.5 mm.

The guy told me it was a Fiat thing and it's the way Fiat set the steering geometry - he said it wasn't worth me spending out on tracking as it was almost certain to be ok - - any comments??

John, at 25000 miles and with 4.5mm tread left I think you are doing amazingly well. I have just had my second annual service at 14400 miles and my tyres are at 3.5mm all round which I considered to be reasonable.

I wouldn't take what the tyre guy said as gospel (especially if he only mentioned tracking as opposed to alignment) as wear on the inner edge is more likely to come from too much negative camber and/or too much toe out, neither of which are standard settings on the 500.

I would definitely have the car checked by a reputable alignment specialist on a 4 wheel alignment rig, because a properly set up car feels so good.

As you are hoping to keep the car for some time having it properly set up will pay dividends in the long run.

I use a company with Hunter equipment but it is more the skill of the operator than the equipment so maybe do a bit of research to find out who in the Canterbury area has a good reputation.

Re: Uneven Tyre Wear - a Fiat thing ??

Only done about 10,000 miles in my 500 - but split across two wheel/tyres ... 14" steel jobbies with Continental tyres , and 15" multispoke alloys with bridgestone

I measure my tyre with a depth gauge every now and then - and in all cases, it was spot on even wear throughout the tyre

So .. maybe ..

1.) Tracking issue
2.) Driving like you stole it?
3.) Little martians

Re: Uneven Tyre Wear - a Fiat thing ??

Panda 100hp's are well known for chewing up their tyres in an uneven manner. I've done just over 11k miles (3k miles of those on winter tyres) and both sets of tyres on my car seem to be wearing evenly. Personally I'd have the tracking and geometry checked out if it were me. I did rotate my tyres at just under 9k miles which may help a little

Thanks to all for useful and informative replies. Out of interest they guy did say that they found Pandas to be the worst. He said one of the other guys working there had a Panda and called him over. Asked him what he thought of the tyre wear on the front of his Panda and he replied 'irritating' - wear more on the insides. ???

Anyway, i think I will have the set up checked just to be on the safe side.

I did swaps fonts to rears at around 12,000 so I've now got 4 tyres which are more worn on the inner edge so at least it's a matched set

I don't suppose this is a warranty job