My 91 has been handling poorly as of late. Its subtle, but it feels unstable even cruising at legal speeds on the highway. The rearend feels all wiggly when you put power down in turns, and she goes from understeer to oversteer in the blink of an eye.

This has come on in the last couple of months. The suspension is all original with the exception of 4 new Bilstein shocks last year. At this point, I've inspected it myself and had it inspected by a suspension pro I trust. The mechanic has found nothing but is leaning towards blaming the shocks. The bushings look good, all the solid pieces are straight and firmly in place, the link ends looks solid. The tires have about 5k miles on them and check out ok. The suspension will hold an alignment.

Does anyone have a guess as to what might be the problem?

 

What tires are you using?

 

Have you checked your wheel bearings?

 

:iagree: Jack up the rear, put your hands @ 6 & 12 if theres movement, bingo. Good Luck :seeya :flag

 

no movement.

 

I'm using Pirelli P7000 Supersports. They've done me well; good traction in the wet or dry, and have even performed well at the track.

 

Could be the bushings have stopped bushing. Eleven years of Vete type of driving will do them in. New shocks may have just worked the bushings to the point of failure.

 

When was the last time you had an alignment? You said it would hold, but didn't say if the car was actually aligned.

 

had it realigned a year ago. when my mechanic put it back on the rack this morning, it was still in alignment.

tis a puzzlement. my temptation at this point is go after the ujoints and bushings etc and say to heck with it.

 

:cheers: How old are your shocks?

They don't have to be leaking to be worn out...I went through a set of Billstein Z51 shocks in 25000 miles. I noticed the symptoms you seem to be describing

If you have more than 25,000 miles on them, I would start there

:steering:

 

Well i am going through a similar situation and i have already replaced the stock shocks with the blistein sport shocks and i also upgraded my sway bars but i am still not happy. It did improve it a little but not enough so now i have the sport rear spring on order so hopefully that will take car of my problem. I am basically having the same problem, the rear of the car feels bouncy. Well i can keep you posted. And if you find anything out let me know. Thanks. Hope this helps.

 

Toe rods, bad bushings and worn bearings/hubs.

 

How old is your rack, miles?There good for 60,000 miles , then start to loosen up! :chevy

 

How about your springs?

if they are starting to splinter that could cause the problems too.. the front end on my vette felt that way unt il I swapped to a good spring..

 

Check to make sure the 4 long bolts that secure the driveline support beam are good and tight. They do work loose.

Inspect your tires for flat spots and/or uneven tire wear and make sure the pressure is where it should be. Maybe have the alignment checked as well.

Bad wheel bearings make lots of noise. You'd know it if you had one.

This may sound dumb but I've seen it happen. Make sure all your lug nuts are tight.

Check and make sure your sway bar mounts are secure and the rubber/polyurethane is good. I've seen one side come loose and the car really handles bad!

Everything else I can think of goes away gradually and not a one day it's OK and the next it sucks, type thing.

Big Jim

BIG JIM

 

I think this may be the ticket...

So I eventually got frustrated with my shop and brought the car home to check it out myself. In preparation, I called Gordon Killebrew and got his advice. He echoed a lot of the advice I got here;

In addition to the obvious

* bushings
* u-joints
* bearings
* tire out of balance


he said the wiggle wobble could be caused

* end play (in/out) in the axle assembly
* Rack and pinion center bolt loose (though the rack itself wouldn't be the culprit)
* C-Beam (the centerline girder between tranny and diff) could have worked loose on the diff
* motor mounts -- would have never thought of that, but it makes sense
* tie end mount to differential -- could be loose but not cause aligntment problem. the tie ends should twist, but if they twist too easily, this center element could be to blame

All of the obvious things had allegedly been checked in the shop, so I started with the less obvious things he suggested. When those all checked out, I decided to recheck the obvious things.

Long story short, I checked the wheels for play, and found none. then a light bulb went off. I had the parking brake set. When I released the parking brake, the left rear had a bit of 6/12 play, and a lesser amount of 9/3 play. Does that sound like a wheel bearing (its not making any discernible noise)?

 

Gordon is full of great information. Looks like you found part of the culprit. :yesnod:

 

Beat me to it.

:iagree: