Just got new rear tires and the annoying shimmy in the car at 70mph+ went away I chased this shimmy for the last three years! Nothing I did touched it. Tires all along. The balance weights are in vastly different places on the new tires. This teaches me two things: 1) the next time ride quality is driving me nuts, I'm getting my tires rebalanced first 2)find a shop that does tires well and stick with them. Places like CostCo and BJ's WholeSale might have deals, but their techs...might not be the most motivated, now that I consider it.
Chris, Glad to hear you healed your pain!:TU: Tires are the issue in shimmy issues more often than not. I hang alot of tires and balance and align alot of vehicles so I have some experience in this area. Some times the more high performance you get in tires (lower profiles) you run into road force variation value issues. Even if you have a perfect balance, the contact areas in the footing of the tire has more/less resistence than oin other areas of the tire. Same as if you let the car sit in 1 spot for too long. Flat spots the tire causing vibration issues. Alll these sweet looking rims can be a uh-huh to balance correctly cause its hard to get weights on both outter edges of the wheel. (Dynamic balance). Sometimes you hope for the best in a static balance (weights in the center of the wheel). Not trying to teach here. Just share experience I guess. Had ALOT of people try to diagnose their own problem by coming in thinking they need an alignment, when all they really needed was a tire balance or sometimes just air in their tires!
Wayne, if more tire guys were like you, this wouldn't be an issue anymore! I was beginning to worry that the balance clip had come off my flexplate or something
I chased an annoying vibration for about a year. New tires didn't cure it, either. So, I bought stick-on wheel weights, borrowed an old-fashioned bubble balancer from work and did mine myself. You can't believe how OFF that computer balance job was! No vibration now!
Not saying it wasnt the computer, but alot of times it takes someone competent to operate the machine. (they do have to be calibrated)The one we have at the dealership tells you the optimum tire position for the wheel where you can clock the tire for the best ride for that particular wheel. I work with people that still want to do it the fastest way (greatest profit) but isnt always the right way. I get to re-do it when it comes back. I just know when its out of balance, its NO fun to drive. Steering wheel whomping around in your hand is not the way to relax and cruise. Tough on parts too. tie rod ends and such. On the rear a out of balance tire can take out an axle bearing in a heartbeat.
How much have you used the bubble balancer??? I keep wanting to pick one up when they are on sale. But never got a good final word on how well they work. I have the manual tire changer n love it. To many time I spent a whole sunday at the tire center to get 4 tires changed. When for $35 I can now do all the tires I want easy and quick.
My shop has one, but they just bought another from Grainger I think, for like $70. It set me right up. When I finally leave my company I think I'll get one.
Harborfreight.com has them cheap often too. It where I got the manual tire changer for $35. They have 50% off sales all the time. Everything is on sale sooner or later. I think the bubble balancer is $70 there too. Next half off sale I need one. Can't tell ya how nice it is being able to change your own tires any time you want. Its much easier to polish up a rim with it on your lap without the tire. I have been able to work around the weights but it be nice not to need to. Where you able to get them stick on weights anywhere???
I have a harbor fright bubble balancer.............it works great!:TU: The trick is to be certain the bubble is precisely centered before you put the wheel on it. Then install the weights to perfectly center the bubble, an equal amount of weight on each side of the tire. A bubble balancer only does the static balance, b/c the wheel is not turning. That's why you use equal weight on both sides when you do it this way........a bubble balancer can't measure side to side balance (dynamic). The weights must be in the same spot on both sides or else it will be thrown off. A bubble balancer also will not detect a bent wheel. A balanced bent wheel will shake like hell. A spin balancer balances both side to side balance (dynamic) and up and down (static)..........that's why there may be more weight on one side than the other, and they may be in a different spot from one side to the other. I used to use a spin balancer when I was a front end specialist. Regardless of what anybody says, a properly balanced tire will have only 2 weights on it, one on each side..........regardless. When BJ's and other places do it, they usually have 2 or more weights on each side and that is not the proper way to do it. :bglasses:
vibration another thing not to overlook when trying to find a cause for a vibration is an out of balance driveshaft. its not uncommon to find bad u-joints or a bad driveshaft, considering the cars we are driving are 30 to 40 years old.
