Vibrations at high RPMs

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T

turbo99

Member
I noticed that my car was making a loud sound at higher speeds. So I jacked my car up and turned the engine on. I noticed that the left wheel was wobbling. I figured it was the axle so I replaced it.

After doing this, it did fix the problem, but now when I accelerate above 3.5 RPM, the driver side now vibrates. I figured that it was doing that because I didn't tighten the three bolts connecting the shaft to the engine so I went underneath, and tightened it some more to close the space. It did make it a little better, but the vibrations are still there. Should I go down there and tighten some more?

When I'm cruising in neutral, I feel no vibrations at all regardless of how fast I'm going. I feel it when I accelerate past 3.5 RPM and it gets more violent the higher my engine revs.

Also, my driver side outer axle isn't in all the way because it wouldn't move in anymore. :unsure: I did tighten the axle nut down to 134 ft-lbs so that shouldn't be going anywhere.

Any suggestions or ideas would be helpful. Thanks.
 
hmmm...

first thing would be axle nuts for both sides but i guess you checked that...

next thing i would check is tie rod ends and ball joints...

jack the front end up and try to move the tire side to side, and wiggle the top and bottom the same way, with the steering wheel locked...

side to side movement usually = tie rod...

and up and down usually means ball joint...

other than that i would check to make sure the wheels are balanced, that def can play a role in vibration... and you might also wanna check the insides or outsides of your rims, if you've been in any mud or any kinda of debris like that it can get stuck inside your wheel and throw off the balance..

i've seen this happen to so many cars that get snow stuck on the inside of the rim and they can never figure out why their car shakes...


and please use every inch of caution when jacking up the car and putting it in gear... don't want anyone getting hurt... :)

EDIT: you may also want to look into the tire tread, perhaps they were ran backwards and got chopped? or maybe they are dry rotted or something of that sort, so many things that can cause vibration...
if none of these things fix your problems then please give some more details and we'll try and help further...
 
Also check the rims themselves. My father in law had this problem on his BMW that has some rims. We came to find out that the inside of the rim had a small dent. The vibrations could only be felt at high RPM's for some reason. Hope this might help. :roll:
 
Hmmmm, I just rotated all of my tires. The tread is fine on all of them. I am certain that the vibrations is coming from the front left-side only. I will try to swap the rims and see if the vibrations is still coming from the left side. I do run low profile tires-Yokoham Parada-Spec2 205 40 ZR-17
 
not sure if you know what i mean by chopped...

run your hand over the surface of the tire both ways and see if you feel any bumps or waves... not just good tread...

if you knew what i meant then sorry for being redundant(sp)

so the noise just started since you rotated the tires?
if you run Z rated tires make sure the directional arrow is going the right way, and also check your lugs, i know it sounds dumb but sometimes you have to retighten them after 500 miles once you've changed the tires...
 
Originally posted by reckedracing@Mar 15 2004, 02:35 PM
not sure if you know what i mean by chopped...

run your hand over the surface of the tire both ways and see if you feel any bumps or waves... not just good tread...

if you knew what i meant then sorry for being redundant(sp)

so the noise just started since you rotated the tires?
if you run Z rated tires make sure the directional arrow is going the right way, and also check your lugs, i know it sounds dumb but sometimes you have to retighten them after 500 miles once you've changed the tires...
Click to expand...

The noise started after I changed my axle. I rotated my tires about 300 miles ago. The tires I have are not uni-directional meaning it doesn't matter which side you throw them in. I swapped my rear right wheel with the front left wheel and vice versa.

Do you think it has to do with the axle not being in all the way on the hub? I did notice that when I rev the engine, the engine bay shakes and that probably explains why it vibrates.

Perhaps I should recheck all the bolts I removed when I swapped my axle. What do you guys think?
 
i wouldn't rotate the tires like that i f i were you...

i mean its great if you have a 4 wheel drive truck...
but for cars, especially with z rated tires, i wouldnt advise it

it may be the common way, but once you wear a tire in a certain direction it can chop they if you switch it...

i'm sure people will flame away but i did that ONCE and it fucked up my tires, so i don't do it no mo...

and i can't believe you have 17 inch Z rated tires that don't have some sort of directional to them... i have never seen a z rated tire with out some kind of arrow...

and yea, you should def recheck the bolts

but if you engine shakes while not moving then i'm guessing its not a drive train moving parts problem, as in not wheels, axles, tie rods, etc...

did you undo any mounts or anything like that?
does the car run ok? any chance you spun a bearing in the lower end?
 
I have been rotating my tires like that for a long ass time now and the tread wears very evenly. I have had no tire problems at all as far as I'm concerned. That does make sense to keep it rotating the same way. :D

Hmmm, I'll keep that in mind next time. I could swap the fronts and rears I guess if you so highly recommend it.

I did not do any unscrewing of bolts in the engine bay except for the three bolts that connects the driveshaft to the engine.

I just checked my tire and I didn't see a directional arrow on there or a left or right.

The engine does not shake at idle, but when you rev it high, it shakes in the chassis.
 
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