Steering wheel shimmy NOT caused by bad balance

"The Shimmy Chronicles" Chapter 2,000: What the hell did you do??!!??

Finally got my highway shimmy and shake under control. My local tire
pro used the Hunter Road Force Variance Balancer and re-did the front
wheels on my 95 Integra. All was smooth...all was nice.

Then I went in to my repair shop (not the afformentioned tire pro) for
a tune up.

Took the care home. She ran real nice. Then I drove to work this AM.

My steering wheel is now shaking more than Britney Spears' behind. So
bad, I'm now white-knuckling the steering wheel to keep the car under
control at 75 MPH.

Took the car BACK to the tire pro to check the balance. All is well.

What could have been done during the tune-up to now give me a highway
shimmy? "Tighten suspension" is a listed service when the repair shop
does a tune up.

What the hell could they have done to plunge me BACK into the dark,
depressing world of shaking steering wheels?

 

I told my husband about your coloful way of phrasing things, and he
said, 'Hmm, maybe it threw a weight." I said, no, the guy wrote that he
took it back to the tire specialist, and the balance was fine.

He then suggested something called a "steering damper", and suggested
that you take it to a front-end specialist.

 

"tighten suspension" sounds like a good, generic rip-you-off term. It
seems important...I surely wouldn't want a loose suspension, but in
reality, what the heck is there to really "tighten"?!??

Anyway one thing they probably did was remove the wheels and
re-install them...how can you have a vibration with balanced wheels?
Well a couple of ways. The most common would be to use "lug-centric"
wheels on a "hub-centric" set-up or vice-versa. Either way, the
tire/wheel can be in perfect balance, but when it is removed and
re-applied, the wheel will not be exactly in the center of the hub
again. If you have the factory wheel tire combo, this shouldn't be an
issue, but if you have aftermarket wheels it is something to look
into.

Corey

 

Im "factory" all the way.

 

Check for warped disks and a stuck brake caliper.

Even if a caliper isn't stuck, you could have rust in the
brake system (in the REAR brakes) keeping light pressure on
the front pads. This will cause disk warping very quickly.

I had this problem starting at 90K miles and had two new sets
of rotors and several balances before a brake shop finally
diagnosed the problem correctly (at 140K miles). Nary a shimmy
since they overhauled both front AND back brakes for $US600.

Now if I could only collect the $US800 I paid the first guy
who did all the work on the FRONT brakes only and failed
to solve the root problem!

 

Could be....How do I check for a "stuck" caliper?

 

Could disassembling the caliper assembies and re assembling them cause a
prob? The brakes do feel different...maybe a little "tighter" since the work
was done, which induced this problem.

 

Why don't you rotate the tires to see if your car still shake the same?

 

Find a quiet stretch of road with wide shoulders.
Drive at the speed limit for a few miles, then coast to a stop on the
shoulder. Do NOT apply the brakes. Get out and test the wheel rotors
with a wetted finger the way you'd check a steam iron to see if it's
up to temperature. If a rotor is hot, the brake pad is dragging.

 

Im not feeling any additional heat at all. I AM picking up NOISE...a
"thump" when the shimmying starts. The whole ride is rough. Going back
to check the tires for a blown cord or something.

 

In that case I'd start looking at suspension components. Check ball
joints for play, suspension mount points for loose bolts etc. Whoever
did the "Tighten suspension" thing has screwed up. I don't think it
has anything to do with tire balance. Have the brakes been checked?
Maybe you've just got a sticky caliper pin.

Is there any sign of unusual tire wear? It it just shimmy (left-right)
or do you experience tramp (up-down)? In a slow parking lot turn,
does the steering wheel recenter in the same manner in both left and
right turns of you let go of the wheel?

 

Im diving under the car this weekend and checking the following:

1. Remove and re-lube caliper pins. Check for sticking caliper pins.
2. Check CV joints for play
3. Check wheel and rotor mating surfaces for dirt
4. Make sure rotors are installed correctly...this problem started
originally when I had a brake job done.
5. Check wheel studs
6. Check ball joints.
7 Look for other loose bolts.

On another note, like I said earlier...this first cropped up when I
had the front brakes done and rotors turned. Is it possible that a
rotor be out of balance in some way?

Tks,

Rich

 

Never turn Honda rotors. If they're warped or deeply grooved,
(1/8 inch or more) replace them. If you can check a caliper pin, you
can replace a rotor. Why are you having somebody else do your brakes?

Not so that it would produce an intermittent problem I don't think.

 

I had a similar problem on the way home from a Tires Plus. I was just
coming back after having them replace the half foot long risers that
they installed on my stock Civic with a tire change. The morons didn't
tighten the lug nuts on three wheels. The shimmy was the rims wobbling
as the nuts worked their way off.