I recently had to buy 2 new Potenza RE040 tyres for my '8 (UK 231 hps 6MT) as the one at the front were dead (unevenly worn, nothing left in the inside of the tyre).
I asked the garage to put the back ones to the front, and put the new tyres at the back. Because of the previous problem, I also asked them to do a 4 wheel alignement.

Here are the values I got (attached) :



When I drove the car out of the garage, I went back to work and there is a bit of highway. I took the exit (we drive on the left side over here) and a nice long left corner was in front of me. I took it like I usually do (50 mph) but this time I heard a noise and I felt like the car was breaking. Back to work, I then checked the suspension (to see if anything was touching) and then the tyres...One of the back tyre was fitted in the wrong way! I then concluded that the stability control was kicking out because of this.
Went back to the garage, fixed the tyre, and used the same corner to test the car....Same result. A noise is coming from the back of the car, I suppose it is the stability control.
Since this problem, I drove the car a few days and couldn't reproduce this problem again. However, the car doesn't feel right to me. I miss my old settings... Sometime I feel the car moving slowly from left to right, it feel less gripy...

Is this expected after 2 new tyres and a 4 wheels alignement?
does my settings look right to you? The garage had 2 settings for the RX-8, one for standard suspension, one for sport suspension. I think I have the standard one (reference Mazda F157 28 700C DJ3 TOKICO) so they used the settings for this suspension.

Thanks,
Yann

 

your final settings appear to be within spec left and right. and after a four wheel alignment and tires the car will feel different for a bit. the old tires will "take a set" to the old setting and will have to wear into the new settings.

plus the fact that you rotated the tires and replaced two will definitely affect driveability/feel.

I dont think there is anything to worry about except that clunking. I had to have mine retightened once.

 

Check to make sure your lug nuts are tight (since loose lugs are easy to check and dangerous as all hell), and then don't worry to much about it.

If it really bothers you, get 2 more new tires and give yourself fresh rubber all around. Problem solved.

 

I bet if you put the new tires on front It will feel much better. Switch them....

 

Also check the PSI of all tires and be sure they are all at 32. I figure the shop would know this but u never know. 3-5 PSI over will make car feel like its all over the place. Is worth checking out at least. Never heard of the "noise" ur hearing though, thats a worry.

 

yes, the noise worries me. At the same time of the noise, the car was slowing down so something was touching or the DSC was making some noise.
I haven't heard it for a while though, so finger crossed...
I will switch the tires to see if the car feels better.

Cheers,
Yann

 

Ok, I had some time to do more testing, and it is definitly the DSC kicking off. I can now see the orange light (the little car on the dashboard) flashing.
However, I am not driving agressivly...It seems to happen on long left corners.
I have never seen the light flashing before I got my new tires & alignement.
The DSC is still making this weird noise. Tyre pressure is good all around.
Maybe I should wait for the tyres to get used to the new settings, but this problem has really damaged the fun I was having with this car...
Switching the tyres shouldn't change much because the 2 in the front are less than 10 months old.

 

It is possible that your two new tires have a slightly differently circumference than the old tires, thus confusing the DSC computer. You might have to toss the old tires and buy two more new tires to fix the problem.

 

I don't know if this is relevant or not but at one point I had to replace my 2 back tires, my front's were ok. However I was pretty broke at the time and could only do one at a time, this is not recommended to do but I had no choice I didn't have the money to get both. With just one new one, when I was driving down the highway the car would feel like it would swerve left and right within my lane, I didn't like the way it felt at all, a couple of weeks later I replaced the other bad one and the problem went away completely. I had the same model tires on each wheel with slightly different wear. I am not running this setup anymore though.

 

doesn't happen.

yannc, if the dsc is kicking off that often how does it feel when you turn it off? i would take extra care if you try it though cuz this is still strange.

 

Well, I usually keep it ON (it keeps me safe :-) but I should probably try without, in a safe space (not easy to find in Ireland). Should I disable it partially or fully?