What's up guys

I've had my new rims and tires on for about 3 months now with only about 100 miles on them. 17X8 Torque Thrust II's with P275/40R17 tires. Ever since I got these new wheels installed....my car has been vibrating VERY VERY badly. I took it back, the re-balanced them and it still vibrates, they said there is nothing wrong with the rims or tires. One thing I know is that one of my universal joints is going out.....but when I had my stock wheels on....it did not vibrate.....but ever since I had these new wheels installed...it's really bad. Does anyone know what the heck could be wrong????? I can't put my stock wheels on because they are already sold. I started a post about this awhile back but really didn't get any respsonses........what do you think???? Any help would be greatly apprecaited. Thanks

Shawn-

 

what speeds or gears is it worse?

umm

you really need to fix the u-joints that cant be helping the situation at all.


what driveshaft do u have? might need rebalancing


i cant think of anything else that would casue vibrations.

u did say the wheels have the right backspacing right?


where does the vibration feel likes it coming from?

 

Is the vibe at wheel speed, or drive line speed?

That's the first thing you have to figure out. It shouldn't be too hard to do, since the driveline turns at 3 times the speed of the wheels, more or less.

 

Shawn,
That is one good lookin "Z".

You really need to give us a bit more info to help track this one down.


First, was there ANY vibration before the wheels?

Second, did the onset of severe vibration coincide with the installation of new wheels and tires?

Third, did you have to use spacers to get the proper backspacing? If so, were they properly torqued down? If this is not done properly you can have very real problems. Might be something to check. It would be good if you could borrow some wheels to run for a few miles to eliminate the wheels and tires as a cause of the problem...

Fourth, are your tires directional and are they mounted to turn in the right direction?

Fifth, were there ANY upgrades or changes to the vehicle that preceeded the vibration noise - eg did you change the torque arm bushing to polyurethane or something?

sixth, can you give us some idea what the vibration sounds like, and where it seems to originate?

Give us a bit more info and maybe we can come up with something...

Speedy

 

Thanks for the kind words SpeedGraphic

Well.....


The wheels didn't need any spacers or anything. I'm not sure what backspacing they went with....they just ordered what they needed. It mostly feels like the vibration is coming from the front....almost like there is a buldge or something in the tires. I checked all of the tire pressure which is fine and the tires were installed all in the same direction. My car never vibrated with my stock wheels on it. Basically the guy said it's my problem and that's what really anger's me....

When I put it into gear or reverse, there is a big "clunk" sound...sounds like the universal joints...but I still don't know why the car vibrates now, and not with the stock wheels. And there were no modifications that I've done to any of the suspension.

Also, my steering wheel "shimmies" back and fourth when I'm driving about 60 MPH....but there are no noises when the car vibrates. The vibrations seems to start at about 20MPH.
The vibration is so bad that my dash board rattles up and down and my passenger seats wobbles. The owner of the shop drove it and said he felt nothing and that's how it is supposed to ride....he thought he was talking to a dumby. This guy also said that it was impossible to get a set of 17X9.5 rims on my car....so that's why he had to order 17X8's. I told him that I know plenty of guys running 9.5 inch rims on their third gen...and he said "they must have had spacers or something"....which I knew was a bunch of crap too.

I'm just worried that the place I bought them from will not do anything about it because it's been since October...but..I've only put a little over 100 miles on them.....I can't get it out until the weather starts to straighten up either....whic is in about 2-3 more months....

 

Bad universal joints WILL cause a horrible vibration. I've had it happen once.

And it'll get worse quickly. You may want to change the bad one to disspell that as a cause 1st.....

 

Plainly, a drive shaft or U-joint problem won't cause that.

Sounds to me like you have a bent or off-center wheel, or a defective tire.

Lots of cars have wheels that will fit these cars. Nealry all RWD GM cars share its wheel configuration. Simplest thing to do would be to borrow a pair of wheels and tires from somebody that you know to test with; a pair of the ones off a S truck or a G-body (Monte Carlo, Cutlass, etc.) would be about perfect. Try substituting them for the fronts first, then the rears. If you can swap them onto your car and the problem goes away, then you know where your issue is.

Again, is it a wheel vibe, or a drive line vibe? That's the very first step in troubleshooting this sort of thing. If you can at least narrow it down that far, you won't waste a bunch of time and money working on the totally wrong part of the car.

Meanwhile, if you know or even suspect that you have defective U-joints, replace them even if they're not the cause of the vibe. That's just plain ordinary common sense.

 

RB83L69 is right.

The CLUNK you describe going into gear is a pretty clear indicator that you need to replace the Ujoints. I would do that as soon as possible. If the Ujoint goes you will be walking. A front u-joint has been known to cause even more fun than that!

It doesn't sound like the vibration you are getting is related to the U-joint/driveshaft problem.

More questions:
Does the frequency of vibration go up in pitch or duration with any increase in speed?

If the frequency rises with speed do you notice that it drops back slightly lower and rises with gear change?

If the answer to both questions is Yes then you might have something driveline related.

I strongly suspect that the answer to the first is YES and the answer to the second question is NO. If that is the case I would look at wheels/tires. Like RB83L69 said, most rear wheel drive GM Vehicles have similar backspacing and share a bolt pattern with the Fbody. When I upgraded the wheels on my Camaro I mounted the rims and tires I removed on my S-10. They were the same diameter and everything so I did not have to change the speedo.

Do the test as he descbribes - Front then Rear with borrowed rims and tires. I think you will quickly find that the problem is with the Tires or the Rims.

Unless you have something in writing where you took the car back to be looked at by the people you bought them from You can probably expect to get hosed after it has taken this long to fix. If there is a mileage stated on your bill for rim/tire replacement and like you say only 100 or so miles have been driven since then you might have a chance in Small Claims Court if it should come to that.

Good Luck and let us know!

 

You really need to stop going to that shop, it sounds like they are a bunch of a holes who only want your money. If you took it back for a balance check which they did the first time who is to say they didnt just say "oh its fine they are balanced ok". I would find another shop to take it to for a second opinion if the tests mentioned above dont help.

 

My brother has an 87 Z28 with IROC wheels....what I'll do it swap his wheel to mine and see if it goes away. Also....the guy ordered the same backspacing so the wheels can be rotated....I could also switch the front to the back....because the vibration is coming from the front for sure..

 

Let us know how it comes out and what you find...

Speedy

 

Not really disagreeing with you RB - But IF you have a bad U-joint causing the entire car to possibly vibrate, won't it make finding any other possible causes harder to find???

I would think so.

 

alright...well...this is what I've narrowed it down to:


I can almost bet it is one of the front tires. If it were a rim, they would have known when they balanced them. It has been balanced twice...and they said that the rims were fine. I asked if the tires were good, they said yes, but how can they prove it? they didn't test the tires? Is it even possible to test tires? Like if they are warped or have bludges in them??

 

The tires were on the rims when balanced right?? How many weights did they have to put on to balance it?? If it seems like a lot, sometimes they can break the seal on the tire, rotate it 180 degrees on the rim and re-balance it with less weights required.

Glad to hear you're narrowing it down though!!

 

For the hell of it why not try the trans mount? that could do similar. Pretty easy to check and for the hell of it if it's the stock unit go poly. I did that just for the heck of it to replace my old unit when I changed my trans filter. A lot of the time I hear about the clunk thing most people fix it with the trans mount or it's something else.

 

I checked the Trans Mount awhile back and it was fine..thanks for the heads up though....

Anyhow....is it pretty easy to change a universal joint? I better get my car to a garage and start at it....this problem isn't going to go away....and I'll probably even have to bring my lawyer in....

 

You are right. The sooner you get started on resolving the problem the more likely you will be able to end it satisfactorily...

It is not all that hard changing the U-joints, but I'd try to get the tire/wheel issue settled before I did anything...

 

That's the thing though....the shop will not even look at my car anymore until the u-joint is fixed....because to him....that is the problem. This guy is such an idiot though.....when he test drove it....he came back and said..."I don't feel anything" but then he starts saying, "I think your engine is running on 7 cylinders, and your universal joint is going out". There is NOWAY my car was running on 7 cylinders because I had my car hooked up to a diacom a day before and it was running perfectly. So this is going to be VERY hard because one second he said the car is fine, the next he says something different.....

 

are you using hub centric rings, or did they just bolt the wheels on and go? if you don't use a hub centric ring on an aftermarket rim, it won't seat right on the hub, and won't spin true on the car.

 

I have no idea.....? It just feels like the front passenger tire or rim though...

 

it's easy to find out if they installed them. jack up your car and take one of the wheels off. all it is, is just a small aluminum ring that slides over the hub to center the rim. if they are not there, place the wheel against the hub and see if it can move around. if it does, take it back and have them order a set of rings for your application. of course, if the rims are made for your specific vehicle then they are not needed.

 

Before I did anything to Ujoints or whatever, I would do the tire test by borrowing two tires from another vehicle. Try them on the front first. If the vibration goes away then you know the problem is rim/tire related. Then you can zero in on it from there.

It does sound like a tire problem and not UJoints...

 

I agree with the post above. You need to eliminate the wheels as the cause. Changing them temporarily would help do that....

Vib problems are frustrating to say the least...I've been there- actually I'm still there until I can get another rear for mine.

 

I completely agree, I'm going to swap wheels with my brothers 87 Z28 and see how it acts. I can't do it right new because it's like 12 degree's out....

I also emailed American Racing to see what I could possibly do.

 

I was reading this post a little while ago so if I say something already stated sorry.

I had a big vibrartion in my 91 RS LO3 at first I thought it was flat spots on the front tires...bought new fronts and it didn't help so I lived with it for a while. Then I thought it was bent axles cause I noticed the rear moved up and down a little during a slow power brake...couldn't really do anything about it cause they are dam expensive. I did alot of searching on these boards to see what everyone was saying was the cause. The usual came up...tires out of balance....bent rims or axles....wheel bearings...warped rotors....etc. Then there was this pinion angle thing which I can't remeber if it started when I installed the new lowering springs or not so I was gonna order a new adjustable torgue arm to corret it after I did the front end rebuild.
Well after the rebuild I don't need it or anything else. The rebuild shored up the front end and got rid of the vibration. NEW EVERYTHING. The vibration used to get bad at 65 and worse as speed increased making the dash and everything iside the car go up and down. Now I've been up to 90 without anything vibrating.

It just goes to show ya how throughing ALOT of money at something may not solve the problem. Just my 2 cents.

 

is there anyway to see if a tire is warped or deformed is some way?????

 

Take off the rim from the car and roll it around. You should see if the tire is deformed. None of the suggestions in this thread helped?

 

I'm unable to try anything right now because it's to cold outside. I just wanted to know if there were anykind of test's that would be done on tires....

 

If it is too cold to swap tires in the yard, I'd find the front end alighment/tire shop that has the (VERY) BEST reputation in your area. Take the care there and explain the situation. Ask them to take a look at the car, and give you an opinion and a cost estimate for fixing it. This should probably cost you $20-30 if that much. At this point you have a PROFESSIONAL opOion about what is wrong with the car.

Depending on my experience with the first shop I would decide whether to give them the chance to fix the problem, or I would have the REPUTABLE shop do the work and attempt to get reimbursed by the first shop directly or through small claims court. That is assuming that the problem were something they had something to do with...

The most cost effective thing would be the tire swap test. If it is not possible in your yard/garrage then is is possible that you know someone with a heated garrage?

 

I had one other thought that might explain the problem.

When a radial tire is cold it is not perfectly round. until it warms up it wants to stay somewhat in the shape it was in at rest. As the tire rolls down the road friction causes the tire to warm up. As the tire warms up it becomes more supple and it rolls more smoothly. The effect of this is more pronounced with performance tires that have stiffer sidewalls. Sometimes it seems that as you start off you have semi-rounded concrete block on the wheels instead of tires when it is cold...

You say the car has only had about 100 miles put on it since you had these tires put on the car. Have you driven it far enough hard enough to get the tires warmed up?

 

How far would it have to be driven? I'm going to have to wait till the temps reach atleast 40 out....I have my car put up for the winter time....I dont drive in the snow or rain. I really even drive my car on long distances....

 

I would guess that seven or eight miles would be far enough - at highway speeds - to tell if that is the problem. I guess if it is really cold a longer distance might be necessary.

How long will it be until it gets above 40 deg F where you are?

 

Well....I drove the car...to the shop, which is about 7 miles there..and 7 miles back...that's 14 miles total. It'll probably hit 40 around March or April.

 

if it vibrated when you left the shop when they were put on your car, then i can almost guarantee you that there are no flat spots. just take it somewhere to have them balanced.

on a computer spin balancer, the wheels are spun to about 20-30 mph. that is the best, easiest, quickest way to see if your rims are bent, if there is a flat spot, if there is a slipped belt, etc. just watch them while they are on the balancer. if you see any movement, then something is out of round. it would have to be shaking really bad on the balancer to cause a vibration at those low speeds, though.

if there is no movement on the balancer, the vibration is not coming from the tires/rims themselves.

i still believe that they did not install hub centric rings when they put the rims on. they may have thought that the lug nuts would center the rims. which reminds me, do you have the stock lug nuts on, or are they designed for the rims?

 

brand new lucs nuts designed for the rims....and they didn't use the things you were talking bout....they ordered them to bolt right on with no adapters or anything...

 

would it be possible that my tires are to wide for my rims? P275/40/R17's on a 17X8 rim??

 

I used to have some serious vibration in my Camaro and tried nearly everything to try to stop it.

It turned out that because of my shocks being worn and my upper strut mounts being shot, caused the vibration. I suppose it happened when I was at the 50-70mph+ range.

It did cause some very serious vibration, and none of the normal stuff such as balancing or new tires would fix it, I had balanced the rims about 7 times and went through 2 sets of tires before I finally figured it out.

I would replace those u-joints though, I know its cold out right now, but it really doesn't take that long, and it is a relatively easy job to do.

 

I agree with Sonar_un. Its probably not the tires or rims if they were balanced already. I went through the same guess and check with the rims and tires. I would look at the steering, rebuilt recently? It caused mine cause it was way too loose and worn out.

 

I agree with Sonar_un. Its probably not the tires or rims if they were balanced already. I went through the same guess and check with the rims and tires. I would look at the steering, rebuilt recently? It caused mine cause it was way too loose and worn out.

 

If the onset of the the vibration coincided with the installation of new tires I would have to believe that the problem lies very close to that.

Before I started chasing windmills in a Quixotic hunt for the elusive cause of vibration I would first eleminate the obvious.

He needs to try the car with a different tires. Try two tires on the front then move them to the back and observe.

There may be other causes BUT if the problem manifested itself after tires you have to look there first. Well, I guess you don't have to look there first if you enjoy frustration and unnecessary expense.

 

heres what you want to do man. jack the car up by the k member in the front and give the wheels a nice spin. looking from the front, not the side, and check if the wheel dips at all. also, make sure the place didnt STATIC balance the wheels with the sticky weights. those things suck. a static balance is when you have one strip of weights in the center of the wheel. if they used stickies, go back and have them use the clip weights on the rim of the wheel. guys hate using an alloy balance on the customs because they are harder to zero out. people hate using the clips on the custom wheels because of the look but they work better, trust me. been doing custom wheels for a while now. also, get the car aligned. even if it isnt the alignment, when they rack the car to check the parts they can tell you if anything is bad by shaking it back and forth and up and down(tie rods,ball joints, bushings etc). people think that aligning the car just makes it go stright, not all true. try all that and see what happens.

 

I used to change 100 tires a day and I agree with what Kontrax says, jack the car up and spin the tires by hand or with the engine idle in gear. Check the tires for a static balance and also check for an out-of-round tire by setting something on the ground about 1/2" from the tire's TREAD (not the sidewall) while it spins around, you'll notice if the tire's outta round because the gap will vary alot.

Fix the U joint, that could be the whole problem.

The shaking steering wheel makes me think it could be a bad frontend part, like a tierod. You might not of noticed it until the wider wheels/tires were put on which would make it more noticeable.

If you do find that the wheels/tires are the problem take it to a tire store like discount tire co. or bell tire, they should have a newer computer balancer that will tell you which tire/wheel is bad. Your average tire stores don't want to spend 9,000.00 on a balancing machine. When the average tire store checks for balance the machine tells them only how much weight to tack on, and they can visually inspect the tire for up and down "wobble" while its on the machine, spinning around. Our store had a "road force balancer" which would actually balance the tire, then tell you where to rotate the tire on the rim for the best possible balance. Of course the balance job cost 50.00 'cause we had to mount, balance, move the tire on the rim, re-mount, and finally balance one last time.

hope this helps, I'm interested to find out what the problem turns out to be.

 

In an earlier post you brought up an interesting question concerning if your tires were too wide.

You are running 275/40's What is your rim width? 17 X ?

I saw a guideline for this on TireRack.com. probably worth a look...

Speedy

 

I agree with the majority of the people here in that your first steps should be to fix the U join, then to jack up the car and spin the tires, make sure you don't need one of those hub shims, check the torque specs, and if that looks fine then try different wheels and tires, and for curiosities sakes, I'd check your rotors cause a rotor with thickness variation could cause some pretty hardcore shakage, and if all of those come out on without any result, then sell your car as its clearly possessed...

(j/k) Though after that point in time I would become suspect to whether the problem is rim and tire related... it would be pretty bizzare if a wheel bearing or something caused this all...

 

all of you guys have some GREAT points...and whenever it get's warmer here....I'll try everyone of them....! thanks, I'll keep everyone updated..

 

I have a friend who has developed what sounds like the same vibration problem. When it gets resolved (and I find out about it) I'll post here.

BTW When will it warm up where you are?

 

probably mid to late March...but who know's....it's snowed before here in May...

 

I took my car into a front end shop today. I had some brake problems taken care of as well as the ole Align, Balance, Rotate...

My car has the Fourth Gen "Salad Shooter" rims. Using these rims requires me to also use three inch billet aluminum spacers to get the offset right.

I went to Glover's Alignment in Albany GA. They have been in business probably longer than I have been alive, and they have a good reputation in the area.

When I left the shop the brakes were fine. In fact they were pretty close to NEW performance. Unfortunatly there were other problems... At around 30mph you began to really feel a "bouncing." It became more pronounced as you increased speed and then seemed to get better above 60mph. I went back to the shop and they immediatly got on the problem. They re-balanced both front wheels on the car. They went to the passenger side rear and tried to balance then removed the wheel and the adapter(spacer). Randy, then re-seated the adapter by finger tightning until it seats evenly then tightening down with the impact wrench in a "Star" pattern. He then re-balanced the wheel on the car. When he got to the drivers side rear he re-balanced. It appeared to me at that time that I could see the rim moving in an eliptical orbit but I did not say anything as he re-balanced. I left there hoping the problem was solved but it was soon evident that things were much better but still noe quite right. The bouncing/vibration was not un-bearable but certainly there. I drove out to an area where a brand new road had just been opened so i could be certain that it wasn't my imagination or just bad road causing the problem. Still the same thing. I took the car back for a second time. The owner mentioned that when they balanced the DS rear that the wheel looked out of round. I said - Could be that the adapter was not installed properly... He agreed and he removed and replaced the adapter and tire himself using the finger tighten then torque method. When I left there the car drove like a dream.

Several observations on this.

1. Always do business with people who have a reputation for doing the job right.

2. If something doesn't seem right by all means take it back. A reputable shop will keep working with you until you are happy or there is proof of some other problem eg bent rims, etc.

3. Even the good shops have to work quickly. They make money by getting as many customers in and out as they can. Don't expect them to instinctivly know that they have to apply lugnuts with some care. Remind them if necessary.

This next line should probably be under the vender review but here goes. If you need front end service in the Albany GA area you can't go wrong with Glover's Alignment. They were very concerned that the job be done right and very apologetic that it was not done that way the first time. If you can find a shop like that in your area support them!

 

Thursday, I'm going up to a shop to get my U-joint fixed. I told them what is going on with my rims...they said they will replace the u-joint...and take it for a drive (i hope they don't give it hell) to see if they can narrow it down to what the problem is.

 

why dont you replace it yourself?