Besides worn out suspension parts, I've only seen this bad wear with a bad alignment. Toe in and negative camber, so basically most of the pressure goes on the inner tire and wears them done fast.

 

I definitely don't have worn parts. There is absolutely no slack in anything. Could I have gotten a bad factory alignment? This car handles better than anything I have ever driven except for vipers. It literally drives better than my buddies c6 vette. Could it have been set up too aggressively? Am I just expecting too much mileage from these tires? What kind of mileage is everybody else getting out of them?

 

I thought the only ATS with stagered tires is the Premium RWD.

I have read posts about cupping or bubbles, but not your extreme edge wear. That even faked out the dealer. Just a guess, but maybe a terrible alignment is the reason, since both tires did it. Maybe riding on the edge helped it to handle great or no worse than riding correctly.

Sorry for no real answer, but maybe some thoughts to consider.

 

It may be the premium. I just remember the salesman saying luxury and sport at some point. At any rate, the car is bone stock and hasn't been touched by anyone but the dealer.

After the alignment and new tires, I'll keep a closer eye on it. I really am very happy with the car and my wife absolutely loves it. We have had no problems at all, the factory computer recall/updates are the only things serviced except for oil changes.

If I need to put tires on every 20k miles I'm prepared to do it. My main concern is making sure my wife is safe going down the road. I'm honestly embarrassed I didn't catch this wear before it got to this point. It is just very surprising to me that 95% of the width of the tire looks so good and the edge is gone. I have worn out a lot of tires in my day but never like this.

 

The dealer charged $550 per tire on the rear? Sounds like highway robbery. But that's beside the point, except that you probably need to get tires from now on somewhere else. TireRack is a good source. They're here at tire rack, second one down is the OEM: http://www.tirerack.com/tires/TireS...ntSortCode=53650&rearWidth=255/&rearRatio=35&rearDiameter=18&rearSortCode=54100 Fronts are $307, so by the time it's mounted, balanced, tax, etc., your price isn't as terrible as I thought.

No problems on my ATS, but my Corvette was misaligned (or actually, aligned for racing) from the factory. And from reading the Corvette Forum, most if not all came that way. At 15000 miles the front tires were much as you described, although not quite so extreme. I had what appeared to be new tread on the outside, and the inner couple of inches had cord showing. I got new tires and had an alignment. The rears were wearing fine. Sounds like you just need an alignment, and I don't think they align ATSs like that from the factory, unless possibly the new STS-Vs.

 

It sounds like it probably is way out of alignment.

In 1989 I moved from MS to IL and bought my first front wheel drive car, a 1989 Olds Toronado. For the most part I kept driving my 1985 Monte Carlo SS but when the first light snow fell I thought I would see how front wheel drive would handle in the snow and at this point the Olds had about 1,000 miles on it, mostly the trip up from Mississippi. I couldn't keep it in its lane at 20 MPH and the snow was less than 1 inch, I quickly returned it to the garage and drove my RWD Monte Carlo to the office and it had no issues with the light snow. When I got home I gave the tires on the Olds a close inspection and at 1,000 miles the rears were worn down nearly to the belts on the very inside portion of the tread because the rear tires were basically riding mostly on the edge. I was prepared for a major dealer problem since the selling dealer was 800 miles away, the tires were under Goodyear's warranty but they were worn because of a GM issue. I took it to the Olds dealer and they took care of tire replacement and alignment and washed the car, no charge and no hassle-I bought 6 more vehicles from them over the next 20 years including my previous CTS. Improper alignment can kill tires in a hurry.

 

Update

I have the car out in the driveway waiting for the tow truck to come. Standing up close, the camber is visible, but doesn't look out of whack or anything. Just for giggles, I got about 50' in front of her and laid on the concrete to get a look and holy cow this thing has camber like its ready to go to the track. I guess that explains the tire wear and part of the handling. Honestly seeing it like this makes me wonder how I got 30k out of the tires in the first place. Next time if the dealer recommends an alignment I will have it there next day.

 

We have construction like crazy on our interstates here in Tampa, so my car is constantly getting misaligned at $100 for an alignment, its cheaper to buy new tires when the time comes.

 

Several places have long-term alignments available ... you can take it back as often as you like. NTB is one (don't know if you have them there) ... I think I bought a 3-year plan and it was about twice what a single shot alignment costs. Unless I'm mistaken, Firestone has a lifetime alignment you can get.

 

Update again

Just got off the phone with the dealership. They have completed the alignment and tire swap and the car is ready to pick up. Here's a kicker I wasn't expecting. My car has the FE3 suspension package (mag ride control and stuff) and the camber is nonadjustable. He said to expect to put new tires on around the 20 k mark every time. More often if you like spirited driving. Luckily my wife doesn't let me go out for spirited driving often in her daily driver.

So heads up if you have the FE3 package on your car. Keep an eye on those front tires and stay safe.

Thanks for the replies fellas and thanks to the mods and everybody for making this site.

 

Btw, dealer price for front tires was quoted to me at $350 each plus $97.95 for a full four wheel alignment. Anybody have a recommendation for my next set of tires? The bridgestones grip really well but I'm open to another brand/style if anyone thinks there is a better option available.

 

you have the premium model and you had the tire size correct the first time there are two issues you are dealing with one you have staggered tires so they are mismatched front to rear...this means they cannot be rotated in order to spread the wear out more evenly, hence your weird tire wear pattern....second issue is the OEM Bridgestones on the premium are max performance summer tires with a 140 wear rating...this means the rubber is really soft and sticky for 'max performance' and the rating of 140 is really bad......next replacement if you want better wear get Michelin, Continental, Pirelli, or Hankook max performance summer tires...these are pretty much the only brands that make summer tires in the size you need in a run flat.... they all have a wear rating of 240 or better so should be a better value all are around the same price as the OEM...is you don't care about maintaining the performance of the car you can step down to all season tires which have even better wear ratings (in the 300's), but are not as sticky, you would also want to do this if you frequently see temperatures below 40 degrees F summer tires are unsafe in freezing weather

 

That's some very useful information. Thank you. Here in Texas, under 40 happens for about three weeks a year, so I think the summer tires will do nicely. I hate to sacrifice performance but since it's my wife's daily I doubt I'll get much chance to notice. I tried hard to talk her into letting me have a track day or just one auto cross but she is pretty adamant that I should play with my own toys. Next set of tires I'll put on the harder compound, get a few more miles, and probably won't even notice until I have some alone time on an unoccupied cloverleaf exit.

 

A number of forum guys have the RWD Premium, but none posted about your specific wear pattern. The alignment still might help. The car couldn't have been designed/intended to ride on the edges. If it does that again, there might be some other reason. Still 20,000 miles isn't that bad on summer tires with that low wear number.

If you don't need to drive too spirited, you would still get good handling out of performance all season tires, which will cost less and last longer.

 

I agree the summer tires will wear faster but they should NOT wear so unevenly. I swapped my summer performance tires over to all-seasons for winter last November and with a bit over 8,000 miles they were in great shape with even wear across all 4. After reading this thread I checked them again yesterday after work and they still look good all the way around, the all-seasons will be going on in a couple of months.

Mine get plenty of "spirited" driving and I can definitely feel the cornering difference between the summer and all-season tires. As an example there are two places on my commute where the road switches from due east to due north and then 3 miles later makes the abrupt transition back to east again. With the summer tires on those posted 40 MPH turns can be comfortably made at my usual 63 MPH speed, the car gets too twitchy at that speed with the all-season tires in place even on very warm days. Of course if I tried this with the summer tires on in 20 degree weather I would end up in a corn field.

With your wife's ATS properly aligned for "normal" usage it should be wearing evenly across the tread. Corvette's have a track alignment spec, which will give excessive and very uneven tire wear if run that way in constant daily driving usage, but I have never seen a GM recommended track spec for the ATS. Perhaps there is for some of the V series Cadillac offerings. In any case you wouldn't want this alignment setup for a daily driver.

 

It's plain and simple, what you are describing is a result of a bad alignment. Get your new tires and get it aligned at the same time and your problem will go away.

 

Hi everybody,

I have a '13 ats with perormance/luxury package here in Texas. Tires are bridgestone potenza 255/40 rf18 up front and 255/35 r18 in back. It is my wife's daily driver, 31,000 highway commuter miles and my grandmother literally drives harder than my wife does.

Edit:
Noticed I wrote the tire size wrong. They are 225/40 r18 and 225/35 r18

Combine those two and you'll get the correct answer: 225/40-18 front and 255/35-18 rear.

At about 28,000 miles, we took it in to the dealer for an oil change and while in the waiting room the service manager comes in and tells me the rear tires are so worn they are showing steel. It surprised me, but I told him to go ahead and put on a new pair (he said fronts were still looking really good). $1100 later, I'm at least feeling happy that my wife has safe tires, if a little shocked at the price.

You were right to be shocked at the price, as you can get the OEM rear tires online for ~$375 each. Even accounting for mounting and balancing ($40-50 for 2 tires) the dealer to you for a nice 40% mark-up. Don't buy tires at the dealer, or if you do, have them match pricing to one of the online retailers (Tire Rack, Discount Tire Direct, Tire Buyer, 1010Tires, etc).

I'm not some dumb kid sending my wife out on bald tires or something, I'm 36 and a car guy. I even used to do alignments on my cars back when I was a dumb kid having too much fun. I couldn't align a car to put this kind of pattern on a tire if I tried, and even if I did, I'd definitely know it by the time I pulled out of the driveway. As of now, a tow truck is coming to take the caddy to the dealer for new tires and an alignment.

Have any of you ever seen a set of tires shear off the inside 1/2" down to steel when the rest of the tire looked good? Is this a run flat thing? An ATS thing? I have never seen a tire do this (let alone two tires together) and I'm honestly a bit baffled.

As louie1487 said, that's a very typical wear problem from toe being set improperly. Either too much toe in or toe out will do it. Many tire shops will try to say it's a camber problem, but it's not - it's the toe that does it. I run -2.25* camber on my CTS-V and don't get that uneven wear because the toe is set properly.

Just got off the phone with the dealership. They have completed the alignment and tire swap and the car is ready to pick up.

So what does the alignment sheet say the numbers are?

Here's a kicker I wasn't expecting. My car has the FE3 suspension package (mag ride control and stuff) and the camber is nonadjustable.

I don't have the FSM for the ATS, but I call BS.

Btw, dealer price for front tires was quoted to me at $350 each plus $97.95 for a full four wheel alignment. Anybody have a recommendation for my next set of tires? The bridgestones grip really well but I'm open to another brand/style if anyone thinks there is a better option available.

If you want to stay with run flat tires you're pretty much locking yourself into paying too much for tires. Since it doesn't sound like your wife drives like Mario Andretti, you could go with the Bridgestone Driveguard run flats, which would cost a bit more than 1/2 what the RE050s cost. You can find a number of positive reviews of the Driveguards here on cadillacforums.com.

 

In comparing across brands, just keep in mind that the UTQGS rating is not very consistent. A 200 rated Bridgestone tire should last about twice as long as a 100 rated Bridgestone tire. There is no guarantee that a 200 rated Michelin tire will last twice as long as a a 100 rated Bridgestone. It could be significantly greater or shorter lived. Even within brands, the data can be extrapolated from tests that do not run the actual full life of a tire and are conducted over shorter periods of time compared to several years of driving that it normally takes to wear out a 30,000 mile tire.

For a good performance tire (i.e. good handling & straight line grip), a 20k life is a good result. Sticky compound = shorter life.

 

Response to AAIIIC

1. You are correct sir. I should pay more attention as I write. I had my front sizes written on a sheet of paper and mistakenly wrote all sizes on notepad on my phone. Kudos for your attention to detail.

2. I knew tire prices at the dealer were too high, but at the moment I felt they had me over a barrel. My wife and I had just left the OBGYN with our first ultrasound of our first child after a decade of trying and a lot of disappointments (all good now though, it's a girl y'all!) my focus was more on safety and he told me steel was showing, and I said yes. My choice as a consumer, he gave me pricing before the tires were installed. Same with the new fronts. I needed tires, I don't trust the local shop to take care of it properly, wife needs her car, etc. I knowingly overpaid for tires for convenience. Next set will probably come from tire rack.

3. I didnt ask for the alignment sheet. I'm sure the dealer will provide if I ask. He gave me the specs on the phone. 0.6 degree toe in (way off per his spec), 0.8 camber drivers side(positive if I remember right), 0.9 camber passenger side. Keep in mind those numbers are based on what I remember from a phone conversation 3 days ago. I have a pretty solid memory though. Back tires had too much toe in but I can't remember what.

4. I'm not going to argue with you because you seem really sharp on this. Dealer told me that he could slot the strut towers to adjust camber and I told him please don't. I wish I had access to a lift so I could take a closer look but I don't. I popped the hood and took a long look at the strut towers and I don't see a way to adjust them. They are pretty beefy though. If I ignore all the seam sealer and compare them to what I remember of mustangs I have looked at (I really hate Fords, I couldn't tell you why except I think they drive "funny") they are really nice strut towers. Not like the tube frame drag cars I'm used to, but very well constructed and oddly enough they seem cast (maybe forged?).

5. I don't really care if they are run flats or not, but I will definitely consider the drive guards next set. I haven't read through the reviews but if the community is happy with them I am willing to give them a shot.

I really do appreciate the advice from everyone here. Sorry I didn't reply with proper quotations, etc. But here at the house I only have the iPad and I haven't been able to use my work PC in the past few days. After your replies, I think I just missed the wear associated with too much toe and soft (sticky) tires. Everything else I have ever owned with soft compound was a toy, and I have so little time to play that the tires weather crack and need replacing before they wear out. This car is really nice as a daily driver but more performance oriented than I realized. I'm not complaining, it makes grocery runs a hell of a lot of fun.

I just hope that this thread proves useful to someone instead of being a time waster. Thanks everybody.

 

Response to AAIIIC

1. You are correct sir. I should pay more attention as I write. I had my front sizes written on a sheet of paper and mistakenly wrote all sizes on notepad on my phone. Kudos for your attention to detail.

2. I knew tire prices at the dealer were too high, but at the moment I felt they had me over a barrel. My wife and I had just left the OBGYN with our first ultrasound of our first child after a decade of trying and a lot of disappointments (all good now though, it's a girl y'all!) my focus was more on safety and he told me steel was showing, and I said yes. My choice as a consumer, he gave me pricing before the tires were installed. Same with the new fronts. I needed tires, I don't trust the local shop to take care of it properly, wife needs her car, etc. I knowingly overpaid for tires for convenience. Next set will probably come from tire rack.

3. I didnt ask for the alignment sheet. I'm sure the dealer will provide if I ask. He gave me the specs on the phone. 0.6 degree toe in (way off per his spec), 0.8 camber drivers side(positive if I remember right), 0.9 camber passenger side. Keep in mind those numbers are based on what I remember from a phone conversation 3 days ago. I have a pretty solid memory though. Back tires had too much toe in but I can't remember what.

4. I'm not going to argue with you because you seem really sharp on this. Dealer told me that he could slot the strut towers to adjust camber and I told him please don't. I wish I had access to a lift so I could take a closer look but I don't. I popped the hood and took a long look at the strut towers and I don't see a way to adjust them. They are pretty beefy though. If I ignore all the seam sealer and compare them to what I remember of mustangs I have looked at (I really hate Fords, I couldn't tell you why except I think they drive "funny") they are really nice strut towers. Not like the tube frame drag cars I'm used to, but very well constructed and oddly enough they seem cast (maybe forged?).

5. I don't really care if they are run flats or not, but I will definitely consider the drive guards next set. I haven't read through the reviews but if the community is happy with them I am willing to give them a shot.

I really do appreciate the advice from everyone here. Sorry I didn't reply with proper quotations, etc. But here at the house I only have the iPad and I haven't been able to use my work PC in the past few days. After your replies, I think I just missed the wear associated with too much toe and soft (sticky) tires. Everything else I have ever owned with soft compound was a toy, and I have so little time to play that the tires weather crack and need replacing before they wear out. This car is really nice as a daily driver but more performance oriented than I realized. I'm not complaining, it makes grocery runs a hell of a lot of fun.

I just hope that this thread proves useful to someone instead of being a time waster. Thanks everybody.

Missing the wear is very easy to do. On my Corvette, the car is so low to the ground that it's impossible to see the tire wear unless you crawl on the ground and look under the car. The ATS is much the same way. When the steering wheel is turned you can see it, but we rarely get out of our cars with the wheels turned. Perhaps a little more due diligence is called for, but the wear is easy to miss. And it happens in a hurry once it gets started. The Vette went from almost new to cord showing over only a 3000 mile distance. I might not have even checked then but it was starting to be really unstable.

Congrats on the new daughter. Your life is now changed forever, but in a good way.

 

If this is a dealer you use regularly, print up some lower priced quotes on the same tires from Tire Rack, Costco etc., take them to the dealer and ask if they are able to help you out by refunding the price difference on the tires or discounting future service to make up some of the difference. Explain that you were unable to properly research a price match ahead of time because you wanted your newly pregnant wife and unborn child to be safe on the road (congrats by the way?) and wanted the tires replaced immediately.

The worst that will happen is they will refuse; but you may be surprised and they may step up to do the right thing and help you out. It can't hurt to try!


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