At my wits end! Vibrations!

I have been doing my head in over this vibration in the front of my ute for the last month. It appears at about 75mk/h and get less worse the faster I go (though it's still noticeable) it wobbles the seats, floor and steering wheel.

I have now had the wheels & tyres balanced by 3 different wheel mobs. The last guys were good and spend a lot of time on my ute trying to diagnose the problem.

They spun both front wheels on the ute while it was jacked up. Drivers side spun perfectly with no wobble or vibration at all. Then we spun up the passenger side and there it was, the vibration that has been driving me mad.

We decided to swap the drivers side wheel and tyre, which we knew spun true and balanced onto the passenger side. We spun it up, and what do you know, there is that vibration again, violently shaking bullbar going etc etc.

At this point the tyre guys are stumped and tell me there is nothing more they can do. They tell me it has to be something to do with the hub etc.

I went home and changed the wheel bearings in it for the second time in 6 months, just to rule it out. Vibration is still there, changed the idler arm also. I also replaced the rotors on it 6 months ago and had them re machined two weeks ago.

It makes the same vibration with the hubs locked in or free. Makes same vibration whether in hi4 hi2. I'm almost certain it is coming from that passenger side front somewhere. I just have no idea what else to look at. All the ball joints, tie rods, drag link etc have no play in them as far as I can tell.

Sorry for the novel fellas but I'm at a bloody loss here and I can't let this beat me!

Thanks in advance for an help or opinions.

Matt

Uni joints? Bent tailshaft? Weird pinion angle from lifted suspension?

If it's happening with the front hubs unlocked (so the drive shaft and front axles are NOT engaged) it MUST be something to do with the wheel itself. It could be the bearing (unlikely now that it's been replaced), disc rotor (possible) ... I'd hesitate to suggest suspension unless it's only happening on one road surface (how's it handle on dirt at 80km/h).

Matt, I used to run 33's on my D21 in the early 90's. I had a similar problem no aligner or greese monkey could fix. I ended up pulling all the wheels off and replacing with a mates tyres it was solved. I had an out of round tyre that nothing would pick up. Not saying that is your problem but a direction to look into.
Cheers
John

Well yeah I have pretty much ruled out Universals. They are all good and check out. It happens when the wheel is freewheeling and not engaged to the front cvs etc.

I'd say I've all but ruled out wheel bearings because it was doing it with 6 month old bearings and doing it now with 2 day old bearings.

Maybe it could be the disc rotor? Slightly out of round, don't see why as it was fine before though, you would think the rotor would be stuffed from the factory? I had a guy come out and machine them and he said they were true. There is no mud in cooling fins either.

Would a buggered Shock cause it to vibrate like that? Never thought of that. Again my shocks are about 12 months old, 20,000ks and they are old man emu.

Thanks for the replies fellas.

Matt

Thanks John. Funny thing is we tried two different tyres on the passages side and they both did the same thing, however when the same wheels went on the drivers side both were perfect. I might pull my spare out and throw it on and see what happens with it. It would be a crazy coincidence if the two we tried had the same problem on the passenger side but not the drivers.

Also Tony, yeah she seems to handle fine on dirt roads. I obviously notice the wobble the most when I am on a straight smooth bit of Tarmac.

I failed to say that when turning a long sweeping corner at 80km/h the vibration or wobble seems to get slightly better.

Matt

Disc rotors can crack but if a guy's machined them it's unlikely to be rotors. OME shocks are good - have had mine on (untouched and still performing well) for well over 100,000km.

There's not much else there. The right hand tyre which didn't do it now does it on the left side pretty much rules out tyre and rim.

The bearing might be ok but how about the bearing housing? What about the UCA, strut etc?

What about the hub unlock mechanism. Does it actually unlock? Test: hoist vehicle, transfer lever in 2H, UNLOCK both hubs, turn front drive shaft by hand. A locked hub will turn the wheel (test that too). If the wheel turns indicating the locking mechanism is faulty, you might have a problem with the CV/axle/diff bearings. Doesn't cost anything to find out.

A long corner will either load up the left side (right hand bend) or unload it (left hand bend). Changes in corners like that point directly to the wheel bearing. The bearing also has a housing, this might need to be examined.

Steering rack bushes?

If you want to try and rule out shockies, swap them side to side too and see if it changes sides. That will give you a definitive answer on whether the shockie is buggered or not...

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All great suggestions. Might try swap the shock over though I'm not convinced.

Well Tony when I pulled it all apart on Thursday I made a very thorough inspection on everything. I pulled everything apart and spent several hours cleaning everything up and inspecting things as they went back together. The bearing housing/hub looked fine to me, unless it has a slight warp somehow. Only could tell by having it on a lathe though I suppose.

When you refer to the UCA and strut, do you mean the bushes and ball joints? I think I will have to get a mechanic to check that out as to me, there looks like there is nothing wrong and nothing moves out of the ordinary. It all unlocks and locks as it is meant to and the locking mechanism was inspected, cleaned and re-greased.

Matt

It's a long shot but I once had a bad highway wobble/ vibration in my old AU Falcon ute which turned out to be a front brake caliper sticking on/ not releasing properly.

Thinking about one point you've made: the wheel does it when the car is hoisted and the wheel is turned by hand. Won't be suspension, steering, wheel alignment - it MUST be tyre, rim, wheel bearing, disc rotor, brake caliper ... so forget the inner components, UCA etc.

take your car infor a full 4 x wheel alignment plus have them check each wheel for trueness on the balancer machine, if theres an out of round or buckled rim they will spot it. are the Tie Rods in good condition ? is there any free play in the steering ? have you tried driving at this speed in 4 x 4 ? have you go up to speed and coasted out of gear to see if the vib goes?

brake caliper can cause vibrations, tho i have doubts it would be that bad. a faulty disk is generally noticeable as it shakes worse under brakes.

one thing to look at is the small roller bearing in the hub. if thats failed or missing there may be enough movement (as its only supported at one end) to make the CV etc vibrate.

as you have had vibrate by spinning the wheel with ute stationary, then it can only be the rotating section. ruled out wheels/tires by swapping them. that only leaves, disk, bearings, shaft, or spindle.

may pay to pull out the drive shaft/cv to eliminate that.
remove brake calpire and spin it up and see if it still vibrates.
if its still does with drive shaft and brakes disconnected then its bearings or bent spindle.

So a bit of an update. I swapped out some stock alloys onto the front of my ute today off my cousins d22. Vibration is gone. I really don't understand why it has but at 110 it is so much better. I am going to blame it on the sunraysias not being hub centric.

Looks like I'm going to now go back to stock wheels (powder coated black) and going to get some hankook dyna pro atms. Atleast that way I might be able to get some money for the sunraysias and BFGs.

This really has got me stumped but I guess in the end this is going to be the solution. Thanks for all your help.

Yep thought that would fix it, funny how the wheel specialists are still unable to tell you a wheel or tyre is forked with their equipment.

i did hear that the non genuine type of sunraysias rims do not balance up well atall but the genuine sunny rims are good.

Yep I have lost faith in 'tyre fitters' that's for sure. They are a breed of their own. Yeah I'm not sure what a genuine Sunraysia is but these were King wheels. There are plenty of different Sunraysia wheels out there but if I was to do it again it would be Australian made ROH wheels.

Probably won't go back to steelies again these have been nothing but a pain in the arse since I got them. Don't think there is a rim out there that is hub centric for a d22 apart from the stock alloy. I would guess this is the problem for all steel wheels as they are a generic fit.

Matt

Wait for a moment. Do I recall that the wheels were balanced by THREE DIFFERENT tyre mobs? And NONE of them got it right?

Makes you lose faith in them. Real fast. Glad you have the answer, but you'd have hoped that tyre experts would actually be able to help.