Tyre recommendation (a.k.a. rear arm bearings again)

TB2 · Post by **TB2** » Wed Jun 17, 2009 11:13 am

I just found out that the tyres fitted on my Swift2 rims are 195/60 while the winter tyres on the GTI rims I had before are 185/60. Might well be the reason why there hasn't been a problem with the old tyres. I'll swap them and see if the noise is gone, and if yes, I'll just drive with GTI rims+winter tyres on the back and Swift2 rims + summer tyres at the front. Will look stupid but at least I can go on my trip. If that works out, I'll order the rear arm bearings to be sent to Hamburg where I'll be in about a week, I'll take all the necessary tools and do the job over there.

And I guess the bearing is quite bad actually. Today when I took a seat in the car the back dropped under a big loud crack. I hope I can make the 950km to Hamburg with it...

edit:
Here's to more pictures, suspension in mid, engine running:

edit:
I've put on the GTI rims with winter tyres, and the problem is gone (well the grinding wheels problem at least). And the difference is obvious, with the car in mid, I looked at the difference in space between tyre and body and while the swift2 rims + 195/60 tyres leave about 2mm, the GTI rims + 185/60 winter tyres have almost 1.5cm of room. I suspect the rims are indeed different. I'll try to figure out if the Swift rims have a shorter neck (or whatever that part is called where you screw the rim to the car)

retrodriver · Post by **retrodriver** » Wed Jun 17, 2009 11:39 am

kiwi wrote:
retrodriver wrote:I run Federal SS595s on the front of my Grande Punto, apparently a very good tyre in Australia and certainly I am keen on them, cheap too!
Yea but what you got on your BX? Anyways bit expensive to get a set from Australia.

I now have Michelins on the front, and on the back a cheapy Kwik Fit job and a Firestone looking budget.

The smaller Federal tyres are also cheap as chips here, I think they are called Formoza something or other, I may try them if I come over all cheap when I need new tyres, they are impressively good on everything Ive driven running Feds.

Aerodynamica · Post by **Aerodynamica** » Wed Jun 17, 2009 11:47 am

the original versions where pretty bad in the wet

- ah! that could explain something....

I have 165 R14 Energys on and they have done some alarming things in the wet and semi wet.

Sorry to back track btw.

TB2 · Post by **TB2** » Wed Jun 17, 2009 12:56 pm

Does anyone know the rim offset of the GTI speedlines? The Swift 2 have a clear marking ET25 (Einpresstiefe) but I can't find any of that on the GTI rims. The GTI has the size and manufacturing date, and two things I don't understand:

SL 311
and
CH 4-15

Any idea what these mean, or how much the offset of the GTI rims is? I've really got the feeling that the GTI rims are a bit further apart than the Swift2 rims. The space between the tyre and the outside plastic lining is cleary more narrow with the GTI rims than with the Swift2 rims...

In any case, problem temporarly solved. I'll order the parts and replace the bearings in a week or so.

Thanks for all your help and advice!

---
Carl

MULLEY · Post by **MULLEY** » Wed Jun 17, 2009 1:14 pm

I believe (anoracks please amend where applicable) there are 4 different width sizes:

Normal steel rims are 5j
Gti steel rims are 5.5j
Speedlines fitted to valvers are 6j
Speedlines mainly fitted to 8 valve gti's & a few other models are normally 5.5j

I cant remember the et rating for speedlines, but i dont think its much different to what you've quoted for the swifts. I think the main issue is that you've gone from 185 profile to 195, the new tyres are wider, thats why they now rub.

Was their a particualr reason why you had 195's fitted rather than 185's? Unless the swifts are 6j then 185's are ok. I have myself fitted 185's onto 6j's without appearing to suffer any issues, the tyre fitters said it was fine.

You may have a case of going back to whomever you got the tyres from & handing them back to get some replacement 185's instead, that would resolve the rubbing.

A real shame this, its typical, find some lovely alloys, refurb them with loads of effort, buy some nice tyres & then theres a problem

bleeding typical eh??

All the best with sorting this out, let us know what your final solution is.

TB2 · Post by **TB2** » Wed Jun 17, 2009 1:58 pm

The Swift are 6J's. Problem is that the two old summer tyres that are still god for at least two seasons are 195/60 already, so I had to go with a second pair of those. I'm pretty sure that if I fix the bearings, they should be running with 195's just fine. At least I didn't yet have a problem on the rear right with the 6J swifts and 195's on.

This is what I ended up with until Hamburg. Well, at least it works

DavidRutherford · Post by **DavidRutherford** » Wed Jun 17, 2009 2:05 pm

TB2 wrote:

Those rear arm bearings are very shot indeed.

TB2 · Post by **TB2** » Wed Jun 17, 2009 2:08 pm

David, do you think it's dangerous to drive 950km to Hamburg in this state?

---
Carl

DavidRutherford · Post by **DavidRutherford** » Wed Jun 17, 2009 2:12 pm

Not dangerous, no.

You might find you have increased tyre wear, and you may find that the back of the car isn't as "tight" as it should be, but this condition hasn't happened overnight (I suspect they've been going for some time) and so you will be quite used to it now.

TB2 · Post by **TB2** » Wed Jun 17, 2009 2:15 pm

That's reassuring, thanks.
I'll get all the tools ready that I need. Also going to get some of that filler stuff so that I can treat the rear arms if they show any damage.

TB2 · Post by **TB2** » Sat Jul 04, 2009 12:28 pm

Yesterday I changed the rear left arm bearing. I worked carefully and thus slowly, so it took me a lot of time and by 01:30 AM I was finished, so I didn't do the other one, and I didn't have time to check the temp sensor on the radiator (btw, if I switch on the AC, which doesn't work, both fans turn slowly, so as a quick fix, I'll just turn it on whenever I feel that the car might get hot, until I'm able to investigate the sensor properly)

In any case, I'm not convinced that changing the rear arm bearings solved the problem of tilted wheels! Here's a picture of how it looks like now. A few posts earlier you can see how it was with the old bearings. It looks about the same to me. Although it was clearly visible that the old bearings were not smooth any more (I think mostly due to the car having stood about 7 years without being moved, so there were stripes of rust between where the rollers were), but I'm not sure how a "knackered" rear arm bearing is supposed to look like. The arm itself didn't sustain any damage by the way, so no filling/welding was needed. Well here's the picture. We're going on that trip today, so I'll be gone for a while.

Thanks for all your recent help and advice!

MULLEY · Post by **MULLEY** » Sat Jul 04, 2009 11:15 pm

I reckon that looks better than the 1st piccy, at least you now have a known good rear arm bearing, & can forget about it for quite a few years.

DavidRutherford · Post by **DavidRutherford** » Sun Jul 05, 2009 8:10 am

I recon that still looks angled over. If the arm bearings are now known good, there's a possibility or a bent trailing arm. Not a common occurrance, but I have had it happen before.