"last the life of the vehicle" lol...

This dudes clearly never met my vehicles...


No doubt that's a very fine joint. We seem to have collectively gotten along for most of the 20th century with plain old U joints though, took
us right on through the industrial revolution. You do have to grease them, Spicer currently suggests every 5K.
I would bet money this set I just installed, if they are greased every other oil change, will outlast the rest of the car.
I'm not enough in love with this thing yet to be doing work for some guy to benefit from when I'm dead lol...

If I was doing this job on my Jaguar on the other hand, I'd buy the nice sealed joints.
Near as I can tell they are still original at 250something K though
and seem to be hanging in there. Greaseable, of course.

 

Wolf, Just how old are you for worrying about using the best parts because they may help some future owner when you are dead? Dan

 

Today I learned that moderate brinelling makes jack all difference in how this car behaves lol.
No perceptible difference at all. Glad it's done but that could have been put off for a good while
from the look of things.


Next week I'll see about having the wheels looked at, failing that I think I'm done with it for the time being.


This car is extremely road surface sensitive. I have one interstate that's a few minutes away I use for most of my test loop
and another that heads toward the nearest large city and my gas station of choice. The southbound lanes are pretty normal,
the northbound lanes for the ten or so miles between my gas station and my exit home are really noisy in this car but not in any others.
Even my 80's Rabbit is fine on it, and that's saying something. This thing is so stiff and so 80's GM it's really hard to get a good read on things without second guessing
ones self. Ever since I've owned it it's been "oh this is pretty good" one minute and a few minutes/miles later "oh this is horrid".
After the trans swap and getting the engine sorted anything under 70 or around town is plenty acceptable, the high speed running not so much.
They certainly didn't build this thing for Oklahoma roads.

 

Wheel in question is currently at the wheel Dr.
He also has a road force balance machine so I may visit the other
three to him for that at some point.


I was perusing the shop manual last night and they have a little section on tire/wheel.
They claim they are road force balanced off the assembly line, and they mention that on-vehicle
balancing may be required at times since it takes into account imbalance in the brake rotor and
hub, so they were aware of such even back then. The first thing they list to do is to indicate the tire itself
while mounted to the wheel using a dial indicator with a roller on it to see if it's out of round, I think they
said 50 thou was the limit, and suggested moving it on the wheel in what sounds like a manual version
of what the road force balancers do. And they spec'd the wheel out of true as being 30 thou which that one
of mine was certainly out more. Said something to the effect of the valve stem being either the lighter or
heavier point of the wheel and that most tires have a paint mark indicating where it is either lighter or heavier
and the tire should be installed correctly to start with relating to the valve stem and that paint mark. I knew the paint
mark on the tire was a thing but not sure it's consistent from manufacturer to manufacturer, I have several sets
of tires here with two different paint marks that aren't directly across from each other so who knows what one does
with that. I'm going to have to acquire a dial indicator with a roller on it now for future
use. It's amazing what you don't know about a thing even when you know about a thing until you have a
beyond the normal type of issue with them.

 

I have had both sets of tires I have had road force balanced. I am a big advocate for it with one disclaimer. I have watched it done. I think the skill and attitude of the tech is very important. On my first set he had to move the tire on the rim on one tire four times till it got just right. It seemed frustrating to him to keep moving it. Someone in a hurry might just think "screw it, it is good enough". Dan

 

I strongly suspect that happens a lot. The guy I went to today runs his own biz and does nothing but fix and refinish wheels and break calipers
and seemed to really have his act together.


So the little growl that I didn't know was the wheel being out of true is gone now but the overall vibration isn't effected as one of you predicted.
Next step is to take the other three wheels to my new favorite wheel guy and have him balance them.
Failing that I may replace the rear rotors.
What a humongous pita this is.

 

Had a chance to run the car up to speed without the wheels today, since the weather was nice enough to open the shop doors and not asphyxiate myself.

No sign of the vibration I'm chasing.
There was the very low level and slow frequency thrum.. thrum.. thrum.. over 70 which is engine or exhaust and has been there since I've owned it
and not overly important, and the general steady vibe of a car made such as this one is but nada of the actual make things rattle vibration.
So it's either one of the other three wheels, which I don't think it is at this point, or some more complex interaction of the suspension/tires being
under load and/or just how this car reacts to utter garbage roads. I'm still going to have those three balanced again but I don't expect it to fix
it.

 

Be optimistic. I assume your wheel man will check the other three for round when balancing. You are going about this in a systematic method. If doing the other three wheels does not fix it my thought would then turn to wheel bearings. Dan

 

Well after the better part of a month screwing with it and about $600, I think it's finally fixed.
It was mostly the damn tires.

My new best tire buddy said his road force machine claimed they were around 35 which is apparently
pretty out of whack and he got them down to the low teens. Just did a fairly quick test drive but
that rattle seems to be gone and the car certainly felt smoother, all I feel now is the same drivetrain/exhaust
vibes I felt when running it in place the other day which I can live with considering.

I bet the next set of tires I buy goes to this guy and are road force balanced out of the gate.
I really do not care to experience this nonsense again.

Lesson learned, thanks all for the input and at least I have new U joints and a freshly balanced driveshaft now.

 

What kind of tires are they?

 

Falken Ziex-something. Came on the car, basically new. Plan to run them till they die and replace the wheels with later
17's for tire selection.