Wires

Good point. Tire width makes a huge difference as well. I found my BMW with skinny winter tires fine, put on the staggered fats summer tires, and it would wander up and down the grooves in the pavement.

superswiss

You may be experiencing tramlining. Tramlining is the tendency of the tire following the contours of the road. Some tires are more prone than others. Wide tires with a low profile tend to be more prone than skinny, tall tires. Also a tire needs about 500 miles to brake in before the compound and everything starts to work together properly and the lubricant from the mold has worn off.

Winter Cabriolet

I was wondering about the tire width also. My last q5 had 18 Michelins. I loved them and they were straight as an arrow. The new q5 has only 400 mi and has 20 inch tires. I notice it when there is a change in the road surface or pitch.

redherring

I think that answers your question. It should get better as the tires wear a bit.

Wires

It will be less about the rim diameter, and more about the tire brand/model/width. Tire pressure will impact this as well.

Winter Cabriolet

Wires:
Would you say that door pillar pressure 33-36 would be more or less wandry than owners manual (half load) 29 29. I usually am by myself or with my wife, so I am at 1/2 load.

superswiss

That somewhat depends on the tire and your driving. If the tire pressure is too high for the current load of the car, the center of the tire can bulge as there is not enough weight to push down. This reduces the contact patch as the outer part of the tire doesn't make full contact with the road. It also causes increased wear in the center of the tire. It could cure wandering, because you effectively make your tire more narrow, but it also reduces grip. You can play with the tire pressure and adjust it between normal load and full load to see if you find a level that feels better.

On my performance cars in the past I generally used to always inflate to max load. In particular with my current RS5, the P Zero tires seemed to perform better with max load pressure. I later reduced it to normal load for daily driving and only increased it to max load when I went canyon carving. Now I'm running the new Michelin Pilot Sport 4S and previously had a set of Pilot Super Sport. I kept both at normal load and they performed excellent even under aggressive driving. The P Zero at normal load had a tendency to roll. The PS4S is by far the best tire I've ever used and it feels excellent at normal load pressure. The steering has frankly never felt this good. The work they have done with the new belt design that keeps the tire from changing shape during cornering and hard driving really makes a noticeable difference.

I've never had Michelin all-season tires, so I can't speak to their character and performance, but generally Michelin tires are top of the line. I've had Pilot Sport 2, Pilot Super Sport and now Pilot Sport 4S over the years and they've never disappointed me.

Wires

Superswiss said it very well. Usually I stick to the door pillar recommended weights. If you go too low, it feels like driving on marshmallows. Too high and it's twitchy like you are driving on rails.

It's easy enough to play with the numbers to see what feels good to you.

alex_houston

I noticed that as well. I had the dealer align the car twice within the first 5,000 miles. The second alignment really fixed it. No issues now with it, even with the lane assistance on.

Winter Cabriolet

I drove it from Milwaukee to chicago and back last weekedend and after that ride decided that it was time to take it in because of it's floaty/wandering tendencies. The service tech drove it and said it felt fine. I put my foot down and argued with them. They then had their QA guy drive it while I road shotgun. On the right roads he was able to feel what I was complaining about. We agreed that it was wheel alignment, probably a toed problem. They aligned it and found both right wheels to have too litle toe (red on the alignment before printout) The car now handles much better. what bothers me is that the alignment was wrong when it left the factory.