A screw punctured my rear driver side tire last thursday when i backed out of the garage. I didn't realized it until about 3 minutes later when the car started to swirl, luckily just right before I got on the freeway. So I stopped at the gas station and have the shop there fixed it. They took the screw out, and plugged in the rubber thing that fill up the hole. $15 for 5mins of work, shiet they do make quick money.

Yesterday, I noticed that the steering was a bit loose and a slight alignment problem. So today I checked the tire pressure, and pumped all of them up 40psi, hopefully that would fix it, but nope.

So my questions are could driving for 3 mins with the flat tire lead to this alignment problem? Anything I can check for? How much is alignment normally?

The tires still have plenty of thread. About 5 months old, and probably 10k miles on it.

 

yup, depends on how flat u were. Do u know if it was a slight flat? or do you think u were rollin on rims flat? Also front tire flat would cause a more severe mis-alignment even over a short period of time. In my old civic, i got a flat in a parking lot and didnt notice it for about 10 min on local roads. After I got it patched, i noticed a slight "wobble" in the steering.

 

I don't think it's an alignment issue, I think it's a tire damage issue. Rolling on flat can damage the structure of the rubber itself and cause issues that way.

 

 

it would take something like hitting the curb to screw up the alignment

 

It shouldn't screw it up... but your tire pressures are a bit high, usually low 30's is the correct pressure.

 

Thanks everyone. It makes sense. I gotta have the tire shop check it out this weekend.

 

40psi is quite high. I usually run w/ 35psi.

 

^ Yes, I vaguely remembered 35 as the recommending psi when I pump the tires, but wasn't too sure. So I had it at 40 instead. Just to make sure I don't need to pay again to pump. It's free to release it, but it costs to pump in.

 

I would stick to 32psi. 40psi is a bit much and would affect the handling.