Noise suppression foam can detach in tyres causing vibration

[SeeNoWeevil]

To save your sanity of potential needless wheel balancing, consider that the noise suppression foam may have come loose in your EV tyre causing symptoms identical to an imbalanced wheel i.e vibration at speed. It's very likely if this just started happening out of the blue. You may end up in a scenario where a re-balance fixes the problem, until the foam moves around and it comes right back again.

Personally I will be replacing these tyres (Pilot Sport 4S on a Model 3 Performance) with the un-foamed variant when they're due. I didn't notice any difference once it was removed in terms of noise. Either way, I wasted a whole morning dealing with this.

[Basil Brush]

Polestar 2s are having the same issue and the manufacturer are replacing them.

[tr3a]

Nothing new. This has been known to occur for years.

[SeeNoWeevil]

Basil Brush said:

Polestar 2s are having the same issue and the manufacturer are replacing them.

This is a 70 plate so almost certainly these aren't original from Tesla. I guess I could claim from Michelin. Not that I would want a set with foam back on the car.

tr3a said:

Nothing new. This has been known to occur for years.

I was pretty surprised the tyre shop wasn't aware of it. I only knew as a friend had it happen on his Tesla and that took a while for them to work out what was going on. I may be misremembering but I think they even went as far as replacing a motor!

[Basil Brush]

SeeNoWeevil said:

Basil Brush said:

Polestar 2s are having the same issue and the manufacturer are replacing them.

This is a 70 plate so almost certainly these aren't original from Tesla. I guess I could claim from Michelin. Not that I would want a set with foam back on the car.

It is Michelin doing the replacements.

[Cobnapint]

Never even knew they had foam in them.
School day.

[pcspinheiro]

My 2000 km "old" TM3 has a rubbery squeaking from the front left tire, possibly when weight is put over a specific spot. Took it in for a service and they only did a road force balancing, never admitting it could be the foam starting to come loose. What do you guys think (short video in the link below)?

https://photos.app.goo.gl/BvzaKNM2HJCexfHr6

[TheDeuce]

I didn't know some EV tyres had foam until it was pointed out to me that the new tyres I had ordered (online) to be fitted locally didn't have it.

I can't tell the difference



I suspect these tyres will soon be shuffled off into the history books - solving a problem that doesn't exist! Most EV's have a load of insulation around the arches in any case and if you care about a premium/luxury EV experience, those sort of cars will have that and acoustic laminated glass etc anyway. I strongly suspect that certain tyre manufacturers predicted a tyre noise issue in engineless cars and developed an insulated tyre that it turns out isn't really required... but by that point they had already negotiated supply agreements with manufacturers in the hope that the consumer would replace the tyres with the same in the future. Don't. It's pointless.

[Murph7355]

Noise insulating glass doesn't really help with tyre noise IME.

And the Hankook Ion Evo tyres I'm using (foam equipped) are a lot quieter than the OEM Goodyears the car first had on. Sample size of one, of course, and far from empirical. But thus far I'm impressed and wouldn't have issues using the design again.

[lesR]

This type of tire is not a new thing for EV's, my Mercedes E300 Convertible (2019) had them as standard. Not sure if they were 19 or 20 inch tires.

[dogbucket]

pcspinheiro said:

My 2000 km "old" TM3 has a rubbery squeaking from the front left tire, possibly when weight is put over a specific spot. Took it in for a service and they only did a road force balancing, never admitting it could be the foam starting to come loose. What do you guys think (short video in the link below)?

https://photos.app.goo.gl/BvzaKNM2HJCexfHr6

I dont think that is the same issue. In my case loose foam was exactly as described in the original post, massive undriveable vibration over 40 mph. I wish I had seen this thread at the time, it was only a few weeks later and took two trips to force the tyre place to actually look inside (as I had read about this problem else where).

[SteBrown91]

lesR said:

This type of tire is not a new thing for EV's, my Mercedes E300 Convertible (2019) had them as standard. Not sure if they were 19 or 20 inch tires.

This - VW have been using Pirelli’s with foam inside for years. I think the sciroccos had them from factory if you had the standard 18s.