Tire Noise

ccrelan

Member
Hi Everyone- I have a 03 Black Mica MSP with 11k miles. The only change I have made to the car is Delsing's Klunk Fix. Recently, I have noticed much more tire noise coming from the front end. It is speed dependent and if I had to guess it sounds as if the wheels are out of balance. The one negative of the car for me is the road and wind noise that invades the interior. I'd swear Mazda skimped in the sound deading of the car. The noise makes a continous whomp, whomp, whomp type of noise depending on speed. My memory is poor and I just can't remember if it has always been this loud or this is reasonable considering the tire size on the car. We've had a couple colder mornings recently in South Florida and I have the have the front bushings looked at. I've hit a few bump where it sounds like the front end creaked so loud it made me wince. Thanks in advance for any and all feedback. CC
 
Funny you guys should mention that. I just did rotate the tires this week for the first time- 11k miles. I was hoping it would help ,but no dice.
 
Yeah, I rotate mine regularly and have the same problem. Oh well, winter tires are going on and I plan to purchase new ones in summer or late fall of 05.
 
In my experience, tires do tend to transmit more road noise as they wear down. The "whomp, whomp, whomp type of noise" you describe doesn't seem to reflect the wear related increase in noise, however, especially with only 11k miles on the tires (unless you drive very aggressively).

I live in central Florida and had a few "creaks" from the front bushings when I traveled over the driveway curb just a little faster than normal. Like you, this only happened last week when we had unusually low temperatures in the mid 30's.

I agree that Mazda skimped on the sound deadening. I know this for a fact, seeing as I have literally dismantled most of the interior in order to install the sound damping and sound deadening material listed in my signature. That was easily the most time consuming modification I've done to the car, but well worth it to my ears (much reduced exterior noise and improved sound quality from the stereo).

ccrelan said:
Hi Everyone- I have a 03 Black Mica MSP with 11k miles. The only change I have made to the car is Delsing's Klunk Fix. Recently, I have noticed much more tire noise coming from the front end. It is speed dependent and if I had to guess it sounds as if the wheels are out of balance. The one negative of the car for me is the road and wind noise that invades the interior. I'd swear Mazda skimped in the sound deading of the car. The noise makes a continous whomp, whomp, whomp type of noise depending on speed. My memory is poor and I just can't remember if it has always been this loud or this is reasonable considering the tire size on the car. We've had a couple colder mornings recently in South Florida and I have the have the front bushings looked at. I've hit a few bump where it sounds like the front end creaked so loud it made me wince. Thanks in advance for any and all feedback. CC
 
Another thing to mention is the Protege's history of "cupping" the crap out of the rear tires. Pretty much every protege that I have seen cups the inner side of the rear tires. My personal opinion it is from the alignment from the factory. Add to that the MSP's were aligned at the dealer off of the truck, and half the people don't know how to properly do an alignment...

I have five bucks saying you don't have hardly any inner tread on the tires and if there is tread left it is cupped. Check all four tires for inner tread wear.
Or maybe I'm wrong.
 
It is definitely the tires. I had the exact same noise and when I switched to my winters, the noise went away.
 
Well, Blk Zoom wins the prize! I went out this morning and checked out the fronts and sure enough they were exactly as he described. Now that I have thought about it a bit, I remember the noise coming from the rear more prior to roatating the tires. I remember thinking about adding some sound deadening to the trunk last month.

Now the question is this- what can I do about the problem? Obviously, the car needs to be aligned properly. Do I have any chance of the dealer helping out in this type of instance? I bought the car new less than a year ago and I mentioned it doesn't have many miles. Thanks guys! CC
 
Go and b****....then b**** somemore....then b**** somemore... When they tell you its from hitting a pothole ask for them to explain how all four tires are out of toe adjustment. (Which by the way is the adjustment done on MSP's during PDI)
If its under 12/ 12k. they should do the alignment with no question.

Then ask them why it wasn't reported during the rotation.
 
^^^Interesting...didn't know that adjustment was done during PDI....I don't think mine was done then, as my delivery was hasty as hell! They were pulling the plastic off the ****** seats minutes before I drove off, and it had only come off the truck about 10 minutes before that. I don't think they had time to slap my car on an alignment machine...especially the lone, archiac one at my dealership. Crap.
 
Well, I made a appointment at the dealer for tommorrow. I chatted with the service tech. He didn't know anything about any special toe adjustment for the MSP. He did mention that being under 12k is helpful to my cause. They are also going to look at the front end crunch as well.

Does anyone have any printed material about this PDI that blk zoom mentioned? I would also love it if someone could get me the CORRECT alignment specs for the MSP before I have to drop it off in the AM. I just want to be as prepared/knowledgable as can be when I have to talk about what has happened.

He already tried to feed me a line about rotating the tires every 6k miles. I mentioned that I could handle fast wearing tires but he would have to explain why 90% of the tire looks new and the other 10% is shot.

Any information you guys could email me would be appreciated- ccrelan@aol.com
 
PDI????

and I took my car in today about the alignment and coolant leak

they tried to tell me they'd only do it if it's under 7000 miles.... and I'm at about 7800.... I told them they better do it or I'm raising hell

EDIT: I just called the dealership and they're trying to make me pay for it

EDIT#2: I just called Mazda... and they gave me the proper info... and Ijust called the dealership back... and the service manager just got ownt really hard... by me... the man who was all sure of himself just a few minutes ago was a stuttering and slipping on his words... looks like the consumer wins in the end
 
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I just dropped off the car. This process is for the birds. Once again the service manager started harping on rotating the tires every other oil change. He tried to say that being South Florida constituted extreme conditions with the heat, etc.. I replied that none of the printed materials I recieved from Mazda mentioned that short of interval for my specific car, besides the fact that I only spend Oct. to April in FL. I said regardless the tires shouldn't be worn in the way that they have and had to show him the tires that were on the rear of the car and how the inside edges were fried. It also stinks because it isn't really cold enough to reproduce the front end clunk. I've only gotten it on 40 degree days.

We'll see what they say......
 
Our front suspension is really noisy when it is cold...Going over speed bumps is down right funny.....Is that what you are hearing?
 
Here's a whopper for everyone. Just when you thought you've heard of everything.....The dealer denied checking on my alignment because of the Delsing Klunk Fix. This guy would have blamed a thrown rod on the thing on your suspension back there. I am taking the car elsewhere having it aligned and put on two new tires. Sick of dealing with retards who don't know their ass from a hole in the wall.

He was trying to say he couln't reproduce the front end noise either (seeing it wasn't cold enough) but attributed it as well to the thing on the rear suspension.......

Do not go to City Place Mazda in West Palm Beach for service!
 
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