Constant alignment and tire wear issues.

Dr Pro · Oct 15, 2023

Hey all,
2021 AT4 owner. Smokey quartz, with all the candy. Owned Yukon's for years to tow my boats. When kids entered middle school, boat never got wet, sold it, and moved onto a more comfortable family car and drove Buick Enclave's. Kids are up and out, want to get back to towing but wanted a general purpose vehicle that was as comfortable off-road as on. Thought the AT4 would fill the bill. 16,000 miles later and I am needing a new set of tires. My vehicle has been in for alignments about every 3 - 4k miles. And all the dealer can tell me is that it does not take much to knock the car out of alignment. The worse this truck has seen is gravel. Looking for some feedback on anyone else experiencing this kind of issue.
Thanks in advance for any direction you can offer.

K03303 · Oct 15, 2023

is the tire wear on the inside or outside of the tires, and is it just the fronts or all of them. Also is the steering wheel straight when driving straight on the road? Do you have any aftermarket parts lift or wheels.

The reason I am asking is premature tire wear at low mileage usually is not due to alignment issues, unless you way out of whack. My old 2017 went 97,000 miles on two sets of tires and never had an alignment. I live in NH and travel to the pot hole state of the country (Massachusetts )frequently.

Dr Pro · Oct 15, 2023

K03303 said:
is the tire wear on the inside or outside of the tires, and is it just the fronts or all of them. Also is the steering wheel straight when driving straight on the road? Do you have any aftermarket parts lift or wheels.

The reason I am asking is premature tire wear at low mileage usually is not due to alignment issues, unless you way out of whack. My old 2017 went 97,000 miles on two sets of tires and never had an alignment. I live in NH and travel to the pot hole state of the country (Massachusetts )frequently.

Outside. I have had the car in every 3 - 4 k miles, and the fronts have needed realignment every time. Wheel straight, no pulling, tracks straight. All tires are now ruined due to the constant rotation. Interesting to note that the fronts have been out the same amount each time. Car is stock. The dealership keeps saying I must be hitting something when I drive. It’s an AT4. If highway driving is enough to constantly knock the tires out of alignment, I can’t imagine what the repercussions would be of taking it off the road. In the dozens of cars I have owned in my lifetime, I have never had a car needing alignment. Appreciate your input.

K03303 · Oct 15, 2023

I get why they keep on saying alignment because outer edge is 8 times out of 10 the issue. However, alignments don’t go out of wack multiple times so close together.
Like I previously stated the only time you need an alignment is not tracking straight, pulling to one side, or steering wheel not straight. I also understand the Goodyear wranglers wear fast but not that fast.

It’s time to speak to the general manager, have them look for bad ball joints bent tie tie rods, defective shocks, or even bent strut assemblies. Especially since you’ve had the rims and tires looked at. In my 55 years on this earth I have only had a front end alignment four times, and one was so bad I snapped a forged rim in two.

Dr Pro · Oct 16, 2023

Update. Spoke with regional service manager. They are replacing my tires free of charge. Says it’s not an alignment issue, it’s a crummy tires issue. Goodyear Wranglers, the ones GMC put on my 86,0000 truck, are crummy tires I am now told. Great.

K03303 · Oct 22, 2023

Yeah I have heard GoodYear duratracks are a hit or miss, I currently have them on my 2023 1500 AT4, and they were on my 2017 1500 All terrain. I never had an issue with my 2017, but I don’t know about my 2023 since I only have 1000miles on it.