Knocking sound from tire

spicysaurus

spicysaurus

Well-Known Member
Joined
Apr 10, 2009
Messages
2,089
Location
Austin, TX, USA
Car(s)
2007 MX-5
I'm sure we'll know what's going on tomorrow, but I hate to send the hubby to the shop with no info.

He got his tires rotated yesterday, and today one of them is making a knocking sound at certain angles when he drives. We've looked at it and there's nothing immediately visible: not flat/low, nothing stuck in the treads, no visible punctures or tears. It doesn't make the sound all the time, just when he has the wheels at a certain angle.

Any ideas what could cause a noise like that?
 
If it happens at a lot of steering angle only then I'd guess a balancing weight is knocking against something on the inside.
 
The fact that it occurs only at certain angles would imply that one of the bearings is gone. Not sure, whether knocking is the best word to describe the sound, but I guess it's close enough.
 
First, check to make sure they put the lug nuts back on and torqued them properly (and didn't crossthread/halfass them).
 
The knocking on my car was due to the bearing being shot, so check that too.
 
Is it just a sound, or can you also feel it on the steering wheel?

Check the lug nuts.

I doubt it's the bearing, since you didn't have the noise prior to the tire rotation.
 
Thanks for the advice, everyone! He says he doesn't feel it in the steering wheel. I'll tell him to check the lugnuts. And also not to go to that place again, since they seem a bit incompetent.
 
There's a local tire shop/garage that has the most incompetent employees I've ever seen. It takes them about an hour to replace a car's tires. And that's after you wait for 2 hours, because you're 3rd in line. The only reason we went to them was because they kept our non-current-season tires in their storage, but after those were worn enough to get rid of, we bailed the hell out of there. Now I drive about 5 kms out of town to a place that's able to do it in 15 minutes tops. And you get free coffee.
 
IceBone said:
There's a local tire shop/garage that has the most incompetent employees I've ever seen. It takes them about an hour to replace a car's tires. And that's after you wait for 2 hours, because you're 3rd in line. The only reason we went to them was because they kept our non-current-season tires in their storage, but after those were worn enough to get rid of, we bailed the hell out of there. Now I drive about 5 kms out of town to a place that's able to do it in 15 minutes tops. And you get free coffee.
Click to expand...

When I was getting my current tires installed, the mechanic messed up the rotation on one of the tires...luckily a second mechanic saw it and yelled at him to fix it right away! How hard can this be? The tires are Falken and they have a HUGE arrow on the side-wall indicating the tire direction.
 
Just a quick follow-up: it was the lugnuts. Some idiot at that garage didn't bother to tighten them down.

Spectre, that's twice you've answered my question perfectly! Maybe I should just PM you when I have a question from now on. :p
 
Pull that/those tires off that had loose lugnuts and make sure the threads are ok. If they are messed up return to the place that did the damage and get them to pay for the new one to be installed.
 
Always check the work before driving off the shop's property, or better yet even before paying. When I got new tires on the Land Rover a few years ago I noticed one tire looked smaller than the others. Sure enough it was the wrong size. Somehow that mistake was missed by both the warehouse that shipped my tires and the mechanic who put them on.
 
Oh trust me, I can't convince my husband of anything like that when it comes to cars. I really think he hates cars.

I once observed that there seemed to be an awful lot of Nissan 350Zs around lately, and do you know what his response was? "I can't tell the difference between types of cars."

That's right. He can't see the difference between models or makes. He can see pickup/SUV/sedan and that's IT.

So asking him to check if the work was done correctly before leaving the shop? He'd have no idea what to look for. "Looks like a car, must be okay."

I swear he only knows which car is his because it beeps when he presses the button on his keyfob.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top