so the other day i noticed that my left rear tire is wearing prematurely on the inside(positive camber, obviously). so my question is what could be causing this? since i know that the rear camber is non adjustable I'm assuming that something is bent or broken(the right rear tire is fine). i would just like to hear some ideas before i shell out 70 bucks for an alignment to figure out what the problem is. thanks!
Negative camber actually. Toe wears out just one edge. If camber is out enough to wear out the edge of a tire then it will be really far out.. My guess is that you have a bent "trailing arm" on the rear twist beam axle.
so if it was bent then id have to get a new trailing arm? or twist beam axle? neither of those sound too cheap..i guess id have to get an alignment to find out for sure..
You really can't align the rear of the car since there are no adjustments of any kind.
If anything, you'd have to shim the wheel housing on the axle to be able to do any kind of alignment in the rear.
Only a body shop can check your chassis to make sure that it's straight like it should be.
They have body alignment tools that will see how bad your rear may be and then possibly make the corrections to the chassis, straighten the axle, or suggest replacing the axle so that things are back nice and straight.
Just some suggestions and good luck with it.
Misnblu.com
Newbie member since 1999
Thank you Dave and JBO! 
You haven't jacked your car up at the center of the axle have you? There not that strong and if you put alot of pressure on the center area your bound to bend it upward, causing the bottom of your wheels to pull in, creating your positive camber.
just another suggestion
some may say they do it all the time, and that is great for them. But they may have the upgraded one with "sway bar" so maybe its stronger, or they just haven't done it enough to cause damage yet.. I dunno.
Stephen (manta z) wrote:You haven't jacked your car up at the center of the axle have you? There not that strong and if you put alot of pressure on the center area your bound to bend it upward, causing the bottom of your wheels to pull in, creating your positive camber.
just another suggestion
some may say they do it all the time, and that is great for them. But they may have the upgraded one with "sway bar" so maybe its stronger, or they just haven't done it enough to cause damage yet.. I dunno.
His camber isn't positive, it's negative (inner wear). This also suggests it didn't happen from hitting a curb, very weird.
And yes, I've always used that as a jack point, and never had the built-in "sway bar".
My current car also has hundreds of pounds worth of CNG tank in the trunk...
fortune cookie say: better a delay than a disaster
OHV notec wrote:His camber isn't positive, it's negative (inner wear). This also suggests it didn't happen from hitting a curb, very weird.
And yes, I've always used that as a jack point, and never had the built-in "sway bar". My current car also has hundreds of pounds worth of CNG tank in the trunk...
my bad, skimmed and saw him mention it was positive and didnt think about it lol
I've personally never had problems jacking the car up with the axle either, i dont use the center of it though. but ive seen a hand full of them who have actually bent them before, so i don't suggest it.
thanks for all your help guys! yes, i have jacked the car up once last year in the middle of the axle. but now that I'm thinking about it..when i put my snow tires on the front and rotated my all seasons that were on the front to the back to replace the balding rears i did notice that that same tire was wearing on the inside. i didn't think too much of it though because i thought it could have been on the front for a while(where i knew the alignment wasn't right). but now i see that it's the rear doing it. so i guess I'll just have to get an alignment to see. if i did have to get a new axle though, where should i go? I'm a little weary of the junkyard because any of those could be bent too. thanks!
The chances of getting a bent rear axle at the junkyard are pretty slim to none.
Even if it was bent, it's not like you couldn't take it back to them for a return.
Most junkyards have at least a 30 day guarantee on the parts.
Good luck.
Misnblu.com
Newbie member since 1999
Thank you Dave and JBO!
thanks guys! ill go for an alignment soon and tell them specifically about my problem and hopefully they can correct it then.
