I placed this thread in Totally O/T because it relates to my 4x4 Nissan Pathfinder, not my Fiero.

What would cause a vehicle's tires to wear badly on the inside? The tires on the front need to be replaced anyway but the inner surface is literally bald whereas the outer surface still has about 1/4" tread left.

Also, ever since we bought the vehicle, I've noticed that it is VERY sensitive to ruts or imperfections in the road. While driving, the vehicle sometimes will quickly steer itself left or right ... depending on the condition of the road, forcing me to make drastic corrections (which ends up making me look like I've had one too many drinky-drinkys!). I've always blamed it on the extremely large offroad tires. However, lately it seems to be getting worse.

Can someone please tell me what is causing these two conditions?

TIA

Figure I should add, this relates to the tire wear:
Sounds like a case of severe negative camber. Have everything checked out and adjusted when you have new tires put on, everything should be fine then. Might also explain the jumpiness on the highway too.

Just to add, my Fiero loves to jump all over the place when there are ruts or imperfections in the road. I just assumed it was normal Fiero behavior. Didn't know other vehicles did that too.

More useless info from yours truly:
Camber describes the amount the tire is tilted away from vertical. A tire has negative camber when the top of the tire leans inward toward the center of the vehicle. Positive camber is when the top of the tire is leaned outward from the center of the vehicle.

[This message has been edited by fiero56 (edited 03-06-2000).]

If your truck has anywhere near 100,000 miles I'd say check your springs(they might be broken), tie rods, and the ball joints. To check the tie rods and ball joints you need to get the front wheels off the ground. Then grab the front of one tire with one hand and the back of the tire with the other hand and wiggle the tire back and forth. If the tire moves without the steering wheel turning, even a tiny amount, the tie rods are shot. To test the ball joints grab the tire at the top and bottom and try to wiggle it. Big off road tires are very hard on the steering and suspension.

A vehicle jumping all over the place on rough roads can be caused by the toe angle being off. Maybe a symptom of the above problems.

Scott, if you have problems with the toe on your pathfinder, the tires should be feathering from one side to the other. Either towards the car or away. Hope this makes sense to everyone other than me.

Check out your steering stabilizer. If it's shot you'll get all kinds of wierd stuff on rough roads.

Well, I rotated the tires this weekend. While the front end was in the air, I did the tests suggested by a few of you. On the LF tire, I couldn't move it from top to bottom but there was a tiny amount of play left to right. On the RF tire, I couldn't move it from top to bottom and there was about 1/2" of play going left to right.

Sounds like I have bad tie rods, eh?

Scott, Friday while you were inside gettign the pizza, William and I were talking about the "dead" play in the wheel, and I noticed the same thing you mention. The LF wheel moved everytime the SW was turned, but to turn the RF wheel, the steering wheel had to move quite a bit. We decided tie-rods or the tie-rod busghings(if it has them).