Car Maintenance 101: Tire and Suspension Edition

With dozens of quick lube automotive shops throughout the area, it can be hard to choose the right team to handle the job. Your vehicle is an investment worth protecting, serving as a lifeline between home, work, family, friends, and your next adventure. Fortunately, you don't have to worry about finding the best technicians to handle routine tire and suspension services. Why? The best is always guaranteed when you need a service center near Raleigh, and trust one of our Hendrick Automotive Group dealerships.

We are the largest privately owned automotive group in the United States, with dozens of franchises, collision centers, and certified service centers dotting the country from North Carolina to California. Our reputation for excellence is unparalleled. Our customers know they're guaranteed an exceptional experience and that their vehicle is always in capable hands. Today, we're here to highlight that capability and our expertise when it comes to our tire and suspension services.

Tires: Why Are They Important? What Services Are Essential?

When was the last time you thought about your vehicle's tires? Unless you have a flat tire that leaves you stranded or see a low tire pressure warning on the driver display, you likely don't give your tires much thought. However, that shouldn't be the case because tires are your vehicle's only point of contact with the road. They're crucial to your safety, making routine tire maintenance essential to your vehicle's performance and your control in the driver's seat.

Tire Pressure

Do you know how to measure the air in your tires? Whether you rely on a tire gauge or your vehicle's tire pressure monitoring system, ensuring your tires have the right amount of air is essential. Air pressure is measured in pounds per square inch, with the ideal air pressure for your tires printed on a sticker posted on the driver's door jamb. However, fluctuations in temperature mean this pressure changes; colder temperatures lower the pressure, and warmer temperatures raise it.

Maintaining the proper air pressure in your tires is essential to your safety and your vehicle's performance. For example, an underinflated tire can reduce your stopping power and force your engine to work harder, meaning it consumes more fuel and costs you more at the pump. Overinflated tires can lead to blowouts. Either way, an improperly inflated tire doesn't have the correct air pressure to make the best contact with the road, putting your safety at risk.

Tire Rotations

Routinely rotating your tires is another essential service that can impact your experience behind the wheel. The tires on your vehicle wear differently because of the drivetrain, i.e., front-wheel, rear-wheel, and all-wheel drive. Front-wheel drive vehicles rely heavily on the front tires, causing faster wear at the front, while the opposite is true for rear-wheel-drive models. As a result, the tread on the tires can wear unevenly if they aren't routinely rotated. This rotation promotes even wear and can extend the life of your tires, which is why our Hendrick dealerships include this service with every routine oil change and multi-point inspection.

Tire Balancing

Tires face a lot of everyday wear and tear, which means there's more to tire maintenance than rotations. You'll also want to have your tires balanced, especially if you notice vibrations when you drive or uneven wear along the tread. During this service, our technicians will place each tire on a balancing machine to determine the ideal balance. Then, they'll use small weights to achieve the perfect balance, remeasuring the weight before mounting the tires again.

Flat Repairs

Did a flat tire leave you stranded in downtown Raleigh? Flat tires can be incredibly inconvenient, especially since most people assume they must buy a new tire to replace the flat. While our technicians don't have the magical powers to prevent flat tires or mitigate any inconvenience of being stranded, they can determine if your flat tire is salvageable and handle the repairs to get you and your vehicle back on the road.

Suspension: What Does It Do? What Service Does It Need?

Did you know that tire and suspension services are often combined because one affects the other? Your vehicle's suspension is a complex system with an important job. It keeps your tires in contact with the road, improving your traction and overall safety. The suspension also affects the quality of your ride and how your vehicle handles, absorbing bumps in the road and other obstacles that can create a bumpy and uneven ride.

Component Replacement: Shocks, Coil Springs, Struts, and More

Your vehicle's suspension is an intricate system with many critical components, such as shock absorbers, coil springs, struts, and leaf springs. The shock absorbers, which are filled with liquid or gas, compress or stretch to absorb and reduce the impact from a bump or obstacle in the road. The coil springs take most of the impact, with the struts providing the structural support for the shock absorber and spring on most vehicles.

You may notice your vehicle's ride quality is harsher than usual, or the tires are wearing unevenly. These symptoms determine which components should be replaced. Our service technicians will learn more about those symptoms to better understand how your vehicle performs. From there, they'll run diagnostics and check the suspension's components to determine the best resolution, whether it's time for new shock absorbers, struts, or coil springs.

Wheel Alignments

Although the name implies otherwise, a wheel alignment has everything to do with your vehicle's suspension. The suspension must be properly aligned to ensure your tires have optimal contact with the road. However, everyday driving and random potholes throughout Raleigh streets can lead to a misaligned suspension.

During this service, our technicians will evaluate the suspension and measure angles like the camber, caster, and toe. These angles reflect the position of your tires relative to the suspension from various positions around the vehicle. For example, the toe angle is similar to looking down at your feet with your toes pointing inward, straight ahead, or outward. With every measurement, our technicians will refer to the manufacturer's guidelines and correct the angles to ensure your suspension is properly aligned.

Tire Pressure and Tread Wear

Monitoring tire pressure and the tread depth of your tires are two other critical ways to protect and maintain your vehicle's suspension. Without the suspension, the tires wouldn't make contact with the road. Maintaining the ideal tire pressure and monitoring the tread depth ensures your tires are properly inflated and in good condition to optimize the suspension's performance behind the scenes. Because of this, tire maintenance goes hand in hand with suspension maintenance.

Schedule Service Today and Treat Your Vehicle to the Best

Don't waste another minute worrying about who you can trust with tire and suspension maintenance in Raleigh. Instead, turn to the best and most revered name in the country by working with one of our Hendrick Automotive Group dealerships and service centers. We promise to treat your vehicle like our own, whether it's time for a routine tire rotation or something more complex like an alignment or suspension service.

Whatever your vehicle needs, don't compromise the quality of service for efficiency or cost. Instead, invest in a team like ours and gain an automotive partner for life. That partnership ensures our certified and factory-trained technicians are always on call to handle your vehicle's maintenance, repair, and service needs, instilling confidence and peace of mind every time you climb in the driver's seat.