Written by the fitting team at 24/7 Mobile Tyre Services, Glasgow. Last reviewed: July 2026. General information, not legal advice.
You paid for tyres last week. Now the car fights you on the M77 and you are holding the wheel slightly against it the whole way home.
The suspicion is obvious and everybody has it: they have knocked my tracking out.
Here is the useful truth. Fitting tyres does not change alignment. Taking a wheel off and putting it back on does not move a suspension setting. But new tyres routinely reveal a problem that worn tyres were quietly hiding, and sometimes the new tyres themselves genuinely are the cause.
There is a free test that tells you which. Most people are never shown it.
Quick answer: First check that all four pressures are correct and equal side to side. If the pull remains, have the two front tyres swapped from side to side and drive again. If the pull swaps direction, the cause is in the tyre, usually conicity, a manufacturing characteristic. If it pulls the same way, the cause is the car: alignment, brakes or suspension.
Before you blame anyone: is it actually pulling?
Three different symptoms get called “pulling”, and they have completely different causes.
| Symptom | What it feels like | Usual cause |
|---|---|---|
| Pull | The car steers itself to one side. You hold against it | Tyre, alignment, brakes |
| Drift | The car wanders gently with no steering effort | Road camber, often normal |
| Off centre wheel | Car goes straight, but the steering wheel is not level | Almost always alignment |
Road camber matters more than people realise. UK roads are built with a crown so rainwater runs off to the kerb. A slight drift to the left on a normal British road is expected behaviour, not a fault.
How to test properly: flat, level, straight, dry road. No crosswind. Hands relaxed on the wheel. Moderate, steady speed.
A supermarket car park on a Sunday morning, or a level stretch of an industrial estate, works far better than a public road.
One local complication worth flagging. Do not run this test on the setts in the Merchant City, on old tram era surfaces, or on heavily patched carriageways. Those will throw the result completely. Find smooth tarmac.
The free test that splits the problem in two
This is the core of the page, so here it is on its own.
Ask your fitter to swap the front left and front right wheels, side to side on the same axle, then road test again.
- Pull reverses direction → the fault is in a tyre. Almost always conicity
- Pull stays exactly the same → the fault is in the vehicle. Now alignment, brakes and suspension are worth paying to investigate
That single test costs labour and nothing else, and it saves people from buying a £60 alignment that was never going to fix anything.
What conicity actually is
During manufacture, the belts and plies inside a tyre can end up very slightly asymmetric. The result is a tyre that is fractionally cone shaped rather than perfectly cylindrical.
A cone rolls in a curve. So the tyre generates a constant sideways force as it rotates, and the car follows it. Most major manufacturers publish technical guidance on tyre uniformity and conicity explaining how this tolerance is measured at the factory.
Three things worth knowing about conicity:
- It is usually within manufacturing tolerance, so it is not a defect in the ordinary sense
- You cannot see it. There is nothing to look at
- It is completely invisible on a balancer
That last point is the one that catches people out. A perfectly balanced brand new tyre can still pull, and the balancer will show nothing wrong, because balance and conicity measure different things entirely.
What to do about it
Conicity is a recognised manufacturer warranty claim. Depending on the maker’s policy, the tyre may be moved to a rear position, swapped side to side, or replaced under warranty.
A good fitter will handle that claim for you rather than leaving you to argue with a manufacturer.
Worth knowing: under the Consumer Rights Act 2015, goods must be of satisfactory quality and services must be carried out with reasonable care and skill. You are not being difficult by going back. Do not expect a guaranteed outcome, though. Warranty decisions sit with the tyre manufacturer.
The other causes, in the order a fitter checks them
1. Unequal pressures. The pull is usually mild and the pressures differ side to side.
Check them cold, on one gauge, against the door pillar plate or handbook. Not the figure moulded into the sidewall, which is a maximum, not a recommendation.
Free to fix, and embarrassingly common.
2. Mismatched tyres on the same axle. The tell is that only two tyres were replaced and the pair are not matched in brand, pattern or tread depth. More on that in different tyres on the same axle.
3. Alignment that was already out. The tell is that the car pulled slightly before as well, or the old tyres showed wear on the inner or outer edge.
Here is the mechanism nobody explains. Worn tyres with rounded shoulders mask a pull. Fresh tread with sharp square edges exposes it. If you want the mechanics of it, the RAC’s guide to wheel alignment and tracking covers this well.
This is the single most common genuine cause, and it is not the fitter’s fault. The misalignment was already there. The new tyres just stopped hiding it.
4. A pothole between the garage and home. The tell is that it was fine leaving the garage and was not fine twenty minutes later.
Glasgow makes this considerably more plausible than most places. See what to do when a pothole damages two tyres.
5. Directional tyres fitted backwards, or asymmetric tyres fitted inside out. Check the sidewall for a rotation arrow and for OUTSIDE or INSIDE markings.
This mostly hurts wet grip and noise rather than causing a hard pull. It is a thirty second check and it tells you a great deal about the quality of the fit.
6. A sticking brake caliper. The tell is that the pull only appears under braking, or one wheel is noticeably hotter after a drive and there is a hot smell at the wheel arch.
Important distinction: a pull that exists at constant speed with no brakes applied is not a caliper. Getting this right is the difference between a diagnosis and a guess. The DVSA’s MOT inspection manual sets out how brake and suspension faults like this are assessed at test.
7. Worn suspension or a wheel bearing. Clonks over bumps, a hum that changes as you corner, vague steering. Workshop inspection required.
8. Torque steer. On powerful front wheel drive cars, it only pulls under hard acceleration. That is normal behaviour for the vehicle, not a fault.
9. Wrong tyre size fitted. Rare, but it happens. Compare the sidewall against the door pillar plate. Takes a minute.
What is NOT the cause
Worth listing, because it stops people chasing ghosts.
Balancing. Out of balance wheels cause vibration, typically somewhere between 50 and 70 mph. They do not cause a steady pull.
The clean rule: if it shakes, think balance or a buckled rim. If it pulls, think alignment, tyre or brakes. More on wheel balancing and on a pothole buckling an alloy wheel.
New tyres “bedding in”. There is a real phenomenon here. Release agent from the mould can make the first few miles slightly slippery.
It does not cause a persistent pull. If somebody tells you to drive it for 500 miles and see, that is reasonable advice for slight noise. It is not an answer for a pull.
The fitting process itself. Removing and refitting a wheel does not alter alignment. It is worth being clear about that, because it is not fair to blame a fitter for something the job cannot physically do.
The order to do things in, and what each step costs
| Step | Who does it | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Check and correct pressures, cold | You | Free |
| 2. Road test properly on level ground | You | Free |
| 3. Front tyre side to side swap plus retest | Fitter | Labour only |
| 4. If the pull follows the tyre, warranty claim | Fitter and manufacturer | Usually covered |
| 5. If the pull stays with the car, four wheel alignment | Workshop with a laser rig | Chargeable |
| 6. If alignment is in spec, brake and suspension inspection | Garage | Chargeable |
Being clear about our own scope. We fit, we balance, and we can run the diagnostic sequence above at the car the same visit we’d use for a puncture repair or a routine tyre swap. Four wheel alignment needs a laser rig on a level workshop floor, which is not a mobile job for anybody.
What we can do is tell you, usually within ten minutes, whether you need an alignment or a warranty claim. That saves you paying for the wrong one.
Going back to the fitter: how to say it
Walk in with something specific and you will be taken seriously. Try this:
“The car pulls right at a steady 50 on level road. Pressures are equal and cold checked. Can we swap the fronts side to side and road test it? If the pull follows the tyre, I’d like it looked at under warranty.”
Any fitter who knows the trade will recognise that request immediately.
That is not a manipulation tactic. It is just being precise, and precision gets better answers in every trade.
One real diagnosis
A customer rang a few days after having two fronts fitted elsewhere. Steady pull to the right, getting worse the faster he went, and he was convinced the tracking had been disturbed.
Pressures first. All four correct and even, cold checked on our gauge. That ruled out the free fix.
We swapped the two front wheels side to side and road tested. The pull moved to the left.
That answered it in one move. The fault was in the tyre, not the car, and no alignment on earth would have fixed it. He went back to his fitter with the result, and the tyre was dealt with under the manufacturer’s warranty.
Total diagnostic time: about fifteen minutes. Cost of the alignment he was about to book: avoided entirely.
FAQs
Can new tyres cause a car to pull to one side? Yes. Tyre conicity, a slight built in asymmetry from manufacture, generates a constant sideways force. It is invisible to the eye and does not show on a balancer, which is why it surprises people.
Does fitting new tyres affect wheel alignment? No. Removing and refitting a wheel does not change any alignment setting. What new tyres do is expose a misalignment that worn, rounded tyres were masking.
What is tyre conicity? A manufacturing characteristic where the internal belts and plies are slightly asymmetric, making the tyre marginally cone shaped. It rolls with a lateral force, which the car follows. It is usually within tolerance and is a recognised warranty claim.
How do I know if it is the tyres or the tracking? Swap the two front wheels side to side and road test. If the pull reverses direction, it is the tyre. If it stays the same, it is the car.
Is it normal for a car to pull slightly to the left in the UK? A gentle drift to the left is normal. UK roads are cambered so water drains toward the kerb. A drift you barely notice is road design. A pull you have to hold against is not.
Should the garage fix a pull for free? It depends on the cause. If it is a conicity issue with a tyre they supplied, they should help you pursue the manufacturer’s warranty. If it is a pre existing alignment problem, that is chargeable work and it is not their fault.
Can unbalanced wheels make a car pull? No. Imbalance causes vibration, usually at motorway speeds. Vibration and pull are different symptoms with different causes.
Does a sticking brake caliper feel like a pull? It does, but only under braking. A caliper pull appears when you press the pedal. A pull that exists at steady speed with no brakes applied is not a caliper.
If your car has started pulling since new tyres went on
We can come to the car, check the pressures properly on a calibrated gauge, swap the fronts side to side and road test.
That usually tells you within ten minutes whether you are looking at an alignment or a warranty claim.
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