Hi Everyone! Im looking for a little advice on what i believe is a front end vibration. Around 65 i have a moderate vibration that feels like it is comming from the front end bc i can feel it through the steering wheel. On very smooth roads the car has little to no vibration. Its almost like a resonance, and it is usually worse in corners. I have had the front up on jacks and every thing seems to be fine (ball joints, bearings) I have new tires freshly balanced and just had a wheel alignment. Im thinking the problem may be my struts or wheel bearings (the back bearings do have a moderate amount of play compared to the front) The car sat for 15 years and did not move once before i started working on it! Any advise would be great!

Also, has anybody used the budget wheel bearings from Ecklers that run around 150-175 each? The AC delco ones are quite expensive....

Thanks for reading!
Brian

 

struts?

You mean you shocks right?
Could be.

How do the tie rods look?

 

If its coming from the front, its usually going to be ball joints and tie rod ends.

 

I'm having a similar vibration I've been trying to track down. Where's a reasonable place to buy the best parts for this? Poly boots/bushings?

Vette B&P sells this kit for $450.

 

I have seen these kits from Ecklers for about 200.00. Im leaning away from ball joints and tie rods because when i jack up the car everything seems to be tight, could they be bad even if there is no noticable play? The car is an 85 with 80k on it. It was probably dirven hard in its hay day. So nobody thinks wheel bearings? Is it a difficult task to install new bushings, tie rods and ball joints with the lateral leaf spring?

-Brian

 

Did you check the wheel bearings for play? A few years ago I found a lot of play in my front passenger side wheel bearing. Driver side was tight. I replaced the passenger, but even before I replaced it the car was stable at high speed.

I have a similar shake in the steering that you are describing on my car. I am in the process of replacing all the ball joints, Tie rod ends, Bushings, and some more stuff. Its not really hard, but it is a process. There is a sticky at the top of this forum titled LT4 Suspension...... Check that out, that'll give you an idea of what to expect.

 

If your alighnment was done at a decent shop they should have told you of any bad parts in the front or the rear if it was a four wheel alighnment that you had done. If you do have bad parts your alighnment did not hold. A car sitting that long would most likely need a lot of parts replaced. If they aren't bad now it will not take long for them to get that way. I would start with the basic tie rod, ball joint, shocks and bushing rebuild and go from there. Also, was the balancing Road Force? Any movement in the wheel spindles is not good. Good Luck.

 

I checked my bearings once, they were fine, but the studs were shot.

The wheels were not getting tight.

jack the car up and tug on the wheels hands at 12 & 6 and again at 3 & 9 and see what happens.

Check the shocks, give it the bounce test, not perfect, but it should tell you if they're shot.

 

Does the car still have the same tires it had when it sat for so long? If so, they are probably flat spotted. Radials don't normally do this like the old bias plys did, but they can if they sit long enough. How many miles since you brought it out of mothballs?

 

I have about 500 miles on it since it got it going. First issues were runing issues with the fuel system and transmission now that i got a handle on that and its drivable im on to the suspension problems.

I bought 4 new tires and had them mounted and balanced at America's Tire, however im not sure what balancer they used.

This weekend i had the front apart checking for worn bearings, tie rods, and ball joints. All seemed fine, however they are hard to inspect with the load from the leaf. The drivers side bearing had a very little amount of play and the passengers side had no play at all. I decided to take the rotors down to get resurfaced, i greased everyhting and re installed. I rotated the tires from front to rear to try and isolate a balancing issue and found my rear bearings worse then i thought(Added them to the list of fixes). When I drove the car today i could not get the car to vibrate at 65... Maybe it went to the rear with the tire rotate? it was hard to notice ill need to take the tires in for a re-balance so i can verify. I need a few more miles on it to determine if thats was the problem before i can cross out this issue.

Thanks for all the help, ill do a few more checks and report back! Im hoping with new rear wheel bearings i might notice a big difference.

Any suggestions on replacemant bearing assemblies?

Cheers!!
Brian

 

Brian....after watching the left front fender (or the clamshell over the LF wheel..whatever you call that area) ....lemme start over

After watching the left front fender shake for over two years from some strange vibration.....as it turns out....and after replacing u-joints, wheel bearings, two sets of tires, New KYB shocks.......It turned out to be a bearing in the rear end. The Stub shaft axle that exits the D36 has a bearing that turned out to be shot.

The way I tracked it down finally...was....the right rear half shaft u-joints gave out...I could see that half shaft really shaking around while the car was up on jack stands and the wheels were allowed to roll in 4th gear. I replace the worn u-joints but after test driving it and the vibration still being there...I started looking closer.....I noticed that stub shaft moving a bit but I wasn't sure. I asked CentralCoaster to look at it, He took a large screwdriver and put the pry to it. He confirmed what I feared....that bearing is bad.

I'm in the process of dropping that D36 right now...so I may be wrong all together...but that rear bearing has way too much play in it.....Apparently that bearing is a ~$20 item.....so I am going after both of them.

The Vibration could always be "heard" in the back...."felt" in the seat.....but "Seen" in clamshell over the left front wheel....and when the top was off and the speeds got up to 60ish...there was that percussion sound coming from that area.

 

Excellent feedback, thanks!

Ill be sure to get under there and check out the stub shaft bearings as well. If im tearing down for the rear wheel bearings id hate to have to do it all over again for a 20$ bearing! I deffinatly notice the "clam shell" part of the front fender vibrating, its good to no the rear may be the culprit since the rear wheel bearings were the only hard part that noticibly needs replacing.

Thanks!
Brian

 

Yep...but understand a rear wheel bearing is one sort of tear down and dropping the D36 is another altogether.

But if you are going after the rear end...then the half shafts are laying about and the wheel bearing is totally accessible, just understand you'll have to have something left to hold the rear rotor tight while you break those 53mm Torx screws loose from the inside.....if you got nothing (like the e-brake) to hold that rotor. it'll just spin when you try to loosen those things....and they are always really really tight.

 

I had a vibration in my 86 that wouldn't go away. I decided to change the u joints just cause it had 100K. Turns out that when new, the dealer sprayed the bottom of the car with undercoating, and laid a nice stripe of undercoating the entire length of the halfshaft about 3/16 thick approx. 1 inch wide. I bead blasted the halfshafts and drive shaft in the middle of changing all the u joints which were close to being bad.
So, cause I'm gunshy, I would inspect the half shafts and the drive shaft for foreign matter.