Lexus Alignment

[dragr13]

Ok, my car is wearing the inside of the front wheels very badly. I'm planning to put the car up on a lift tonight and balance and rotate the tires, but is there anything i can do (after an alignment, of course) to make sure that the car stops doing this? I was thinking of replacing ball joints and tie-rod ends, but a good, trustworthy mechanic friend of mine said that there's no point in replacing the suspension points b/c 'lexus's just sag'.

What?

[lenore]

I dont know about yours, but I have a RX300 with 162k miles and never had that kind of problem. My tires wear perfectly even. I would get a new mechanic....

[SW03ES]

Yeah that doesn't make any sense.

I bet it just needs an alignment...

[dragr13]

no no, one thing i've learned is to listen to the words coming out of this guy's mouth. he's a goofy iranian born in germany and raised in his dad's european performance workshop. he's pretty good.

but i think you're right, i was going to wait for new struts to get the alignment, but i guess i'm going to have my buddy do a 4 wheel for me now, and then another when the struts come.

[SW03ES]

I've had Lexus vehicles for 11 years and put hundreds of thousands of miles on them with no irregular inside tire wear...

[bartkat]

This is pretty common with IS300. I can't count the number of times I've heard of it and I had the same thing on my 02. I've never seen a solution for it other than to rotate tires to try and even out the wearl.

[SW03ES]

Really? The IS300 then, not Lexus vehicles in general...

[RX in NC]

Keep in mind that to maximize your chances of getting all-around even tire wear, some specific makes and models require camber/caster specs to be set not in the MIDDLE of the manufacturer's published acceptable range like most alignment techs shoot for, but at either the upper or lower ends of the range depending upon the vehicle in question. Our Jaguar S-Type is like that - if you set the camber in the middle of Jaguar's published range, you'll get excessive inner treadwear on your front tires. Alignment techs with significant S-Type experience know to adjust the camber towards the higher end of Jaguar's range to compensate for this tendency towards inner treadwear in these cars.

The IS300 may be the same way. Your best bet is to call around and find a long-time alignment tech who has experience with the IS300. You may not find him at your Lexus dealership. I would trust a long-time independent alignment tech a lot more since there is so much turnover at the dealership service departments these days, and the reputable independent alignment guys are so much better at what they do in my opinion. Proper aligning is as much art as it is science, even with today's computerized equipment. Find an experienced guy who knows your car, and you'll have the best chance of staying in proper alignment for much longer periods of time....

[SKperformance]

The GS also does it , it comes form the front strut mounts being worn and mulitiples by the rest of parts being worn out.

moved to the IS section rather than the general one.

[sonnyg22]

Ok, my car is wearing the inside of the front wheels very badly. I'm planning to put the car up on a lift tonight and balance and rotate the tires, but is there anything i can do (after an alignment, of course) to make sure that the car stops doing this? I was thinking of replacing ball joints and tie-rod ends, but a good, trustworthy mechanic friend of mine said that there's no point in replacing the suspension points b/c 'lexus's just sag'.

What?

After taking my 01 IS300 to several shops to address this issue it was determined that the alignment of the car was what is was supposed to be....just that the IS300 has a "natural" inner toe that wears the inside of the front tires...especially if not rotated as recommended! I hope this helps!

[dispin]

Its a common problem. I had the same problem with my IS when I lived in Britain. There was actually a place that could fix it and a lot of people on the forum had gone but it was 4 or 5 hours from me.