I'm having a problem with my brakes. This is going to sound weird but here go's. Once in a while when braking, my car wants to pull HARD to the right. Here is the stange part, it seems to happen on roads that arent quite level, that slant off to the right slightly. There is one intersection that EVERY time I have to stop due to the red light, my car pulls VERY hard right. What could cause this? If it were a bad caliper on the left side, the car would want to pull right, but why would it only do it on uneven roads?

 

stock rims and tires ?

 

No. I went to 19x8.5

 

I just reilized i had the problem before the new rims and tires. I had the dealership inspect the brakes and they said they were fine. Although that dealership sucks and i dont go there anymore.

 

It's called tramlining. It happens esp on cars w/wide tires. Varies w/brand/wheel/tire construction/car suspension. It's normal, but sometimes a bit un-nerving.

Check this out http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tirete....jsp?techid=47

 

Happens on my car also. Strange thing is I have a Mustang GT that also has comparable tires and RIMS and it doesn't happen.

I think the RX-8 has a anti- locking braking problem. Its hard to prove and Mazda doesn't seem to want to cooperate.

 

Further...I have the original tires and RIMS on my RX-8. I found it very alarming that I only got 19,000 miles on the car and the tires need to be replaced. I've had many sports cars. This is the first that the tires wore out so fast. All of this seems to point to something dragging. It's also interesting that when my car is on a steep hill it slows done when I let it coast while it is in neutral. This is the only car I know of that actually slows down going down a hill while in neutral. Mazda has no comment to these issues as I've presented them. I think someone should step in and force them to fix these cars. This is stupid!

 

[QUOTE=Spin9k]It's called tramlining. It happens esp on cars w/wide tires. Varies w/brand/wheel/tire construction/car suspension. It's normal, but sometimes a bit un-nerving.

That could be it, however the artical didnt mention during braking and that is only when i notice it. And its not a slight resistance its a HARD PULL. Can tramlining be that severe?

 

Well, my car will coast a LONG way, so I dont think i have the same problem you have.

 

I have the same prob. Its your alinment.

 

Dominion, did you get yours re-alined? and did it help?

 

My car has no tramlining with my new 245/40 Azenis RT615s but did with the 225\45 OEM Bridgestones. My treadwear says I have positive Camber (according to others on this board) my outside edges are wearing far more than the inside edges. I would like to have more even contact but apparently the tradeoff is tramlining...

 

The drag downhill sounds a bit weird, depending on the age of your car, but sticking pistons could drag the brakes on one side, so that's something to look into, however unlikely....

but yes the it can be a HARD PULL...almost like something is really pulling, no make that YANKING, the steering wheel right out of your hands!! A big surprise when that happens the 1st time to be sure!

Although alignment is a possibility, unless you've done something during driving that could take it out of whack (how are your roads where you live?), or had an alignment done (so as there is a possibility they screwed your settings), it is pretty unlikely the alignment was so wrong from the factory as to exacerbate the situation as you describe.

I too had this when I had the Potenzas on the car. Until I realized what it was (as did many folks) after we all discussed it here a couple years ago, it certainly was a concern of many. After getting different tires (in my case Falken RT-615s, although other's different tires would change the severity to be better or worse (hard to imagine!)), the effect was much reduced or eliminated in most situations.

 

19,000 miles seem to be about average lifetime for the OEM Bridgestone tires. I only got 12,000 out of mine, but I'm hard on tires.

 

Wear on the outside edges of the tire doesn't neccessarly mean that you have a alignment problem. I could just mean that you are cornering hard and the tire pressures a a little low.

 

Can't having uneven castor cause this?

 

^ Good find on the other thread. I guess i'm not the only one. It dosent bother me too much, but I dont like it. I plan on doing some suspention mods soon, sways, maybe coilovers. It will be interesting if this will help or worsen the problem.

 

Minor hijack here...

I would like to understand this more. My wear is consistent on both front tires and my pressures are normally 34 cold on the street and about that for track days which drives them to 40 - 42 hot. (I balance each tire hot as needed at the track to be equal 'hot'.

I have been told the wear I am seeing is the result of positive camber built into my suspension settings - the implication is that that helps prevent tramlining and causes the outsides of the tires to wear more than the inside. This makes more sense to me than tire pressures but --- tell me more.

TIA

 

You're running positive camber on a track? Why? You like being slow?

If you're serious about track performance at all and have a stock suspension, slam the most negative camber in that you can. If you're running positive camber you're probably only using 50% of the tire in a corner.