How do I keep the car from following grooves in the road?

[Mark B]

Hey everyone,
I have a 91 RS Vert. I cant stand the way the car shifts left & right on roads where the road isnt flat. Usually the places your tires travel are lower than the rest of the road. I replaced just about all of the front suspension & just had an alignment done. What else can I check/replace that will make this go away?

Check the sig for suspension mods.

[TraceZ]

I always called it "rut wander". I recall my 3rd gens doing it as well. Maybe it is something to do with the strut suspension? Do you have any play in your steering box?

I remember learning to drive when I was 15. I learned in a 1987 Z28 that was only a couple years old at the time. My friends mom was behind me going down an old rutted highway. Later that day she asked me why I was weaving around so badly. I tried to explain to her what rut wander was, and I attributed it to the really wide tires on the front of the car. My Dad had 16" IROC rims on his Z and we always figured that it was the wide rubber doing it. The car had under 45K on it at the time, so I know the suspension was all in good shape.

I have 285 width tires on my current car, and have not noticed any bad tendency to wander in ruts. Maybe it is the SLA suspension in the 4th gen that helps stop it?

[Crazy Canuk]

I notice "rut wander" on my car with it's summer tires. When I put my snow tires on it goes away and my car drives straight. I think its do to the wider tires with lower treads gripping the road better. So in the car you realy feel the roads imperfections. A guy at work tried to sell his 80's Vet and one guy kept on saying it was his alignment but it was just wider tires.

Wider tires in the back and skinner tires in the front may help with it but it's something you get use to.

[Injuneer]

I've noticed it, and it got worse with the 275's on my 4th Gen. It is very sensitive to tire inflation pressure. Over-pressure the tires and it decreases (and you wear out the center of the tread), under-pressure the tires and it gets worse.

Try playing around with the inflation pressures. Try borrowing a set of narrower tires to try on the front. That would confirm its due to the wide tires.

[Performin Norman]

It's nature of the beast with these wide tires. My buddy put a custom alignment on my Syclones and my Viper and it really minimized the road wander. I'm not exactly sure what characteristics he changed. I may give him a call later.

[Joe 1320]

The wider the tire, the more it pulls.

[FroSSty]

I noticed this exact thing with my Caprice. I changed from 225/75/15's to 255/50/17's and noticed right away the extra wander on the road. I think maybe the answer to it is to tighten the steering box a little or go to a tighter steering box all together. The reason I say this is because the stock Impala SS has the same size tires as mine, same suspension, everything except it has a tighter steering box. I don't notice the wander nearly as much in my firebird and it has wider tires on it too.

[Jeff_in_Atl]

It's called "tramlining" http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tirete....jsp?techid=47

Over inflation will make it worse.

Also the wider and/or stickier the tire the more noticeable the car is to it being out of alignment. You have to set the toe right on zero or it will be noticeable. I know the book says something other than zero but setting it to zero has given me the best results with reducing tramlining.

[fastTa]

Wider tires do exacerbate the wandering. Also like fred mentioned, the wandering is also very sensitive to tire pressures.

It's nature of the beast with these wide tires. My buddy put a custom alignment on my Syclones and my Viper and it really minimized the road wander. I'm not exactly sure what characteristics he changed. I may give him a call later.

I think they can put roughly 1/32 - 1/16 more toe in, and possibly just a hair more negative camber. They usually will just try a little negative camber first before toeing the car in more because of tire wear longevity. Normally on strut cars the camber/caster is fixed, but they can alter the camber/caster angles with some custom work.

Another thing to consider is that lowering a car will inherantly change the caster angle. This can also affect wandering, beacuase it can take away the effectiveness of the correct geometry of the suspension.

[Joe 1320]

My T/A is a good example. When I put "road" wheels and tires on that are 17x9.5 and 285/40/17 on all four corners, I wrestle with it a little bit when running in the grooves. When I switch to the big and littles with a 165 tire up front, it doesn't follow the ruts at all.