jkennedy

I put new OE ZR1 replica wheels and new tires on my 1996 a while ago and there is a vibration when traveling 70-80 miles per hour. It feels like the rear end is "bouncing" up and down very rapidly. It seems worse in 6th gear for some reason. I've never owned a vehicle that's done this before and I'm not very mechanically inclined so I'm looking for suggestions from fellow forum members. Any ideas what this could be? I hope some of the balancing weights fell off the wheels, but that would be too easy of a solution for me because I don't do easy, lol. I might just go to the local tire shop and see if they are balanced properly but I just don't think it's that easy, is it? Anyone have similar issues?

Thanks

gpierce

I have had stick on weights come off my new replica wheels too. First thing check all wheels to see if they all have at least some weights, you should be able to see them easily even still on the car. Also look for dusty spots near the weights. If some came off you might be able to see an outline spot where they were.

Mr. Peabody

One thing that you might consider is to have a friend in another vehicle observe your 4 wheels when you are driving and this "bouncing feeling" is occurring. A short video of the rear of the car when this is happening might be useful. If you are by chance running the 9.5" wide wheels on all 4 corners you might try swapping front wheels for back and see if anything changes. If you determine that the vibration is changing as a particular wheel is moved from front to back ........ I would take that one back to the tire shop and ask them to please re balance it.

I've been running OE wheels since 2011 on my 95 with no issues.

RtStuf

Wheel out of round?

ctmccloskey

If it only happens at the 70-80 mph level it is probably an issue with the "balancing" where the weights came off or were mis-located.

If it were a bent wheel it would be constant from 0 mph to 100 mph. I learned the painful way when 2 of my wheels were bent by a lazy Tire tech who insisted on using the Standard Tire machine on some very expensive wheels. The company he worked for had to replace 2 out of 4 wheels from bends and they were trying to tell me that I brought them in "bent". When I drove the car it was obvious there was a problem in the parking lot, the bent wheels made the car ride terrible and there was no way I could go highway speeds like that. These bends were hard to see with the naked eye but made a huge ride difference. This is why I suspect the original post would suggest a balance issue to me.

My daughter's 2011 Camaro has really wide wheels and the tech did not clean the surface off before sticking the weights on, they did not last 50 miles before they were gone. Surface preparation is critical if you want the weights to stay on the wheel for years to come.

Good Luck and I hope it is something simple like getting a "new balance" for the rear wheels to get your Corvette on the roads for the Memorial Day weekend!

Best Regards,
Chris

jkennedy

Thanks for the input everyone, I appreciate it. I will go ahead and have them re-balanced and will post an update once that's done in a couple weeks.

jkennedy

I had them all re-balanced yesterday and the problem is resolved. The rears were each off by about an ounce. The fronts were off slightly as well. I hope this helps anyone else if they have similar issues. Thanks all!

gpierce

Glad it was simple