2005 Lexus IS300

Recently gained an oscillating feeling about 40 mph. Car rides rough. And near 50 mph, it starts to really vibrate the steering wheel badly.

I changed my pads and rotors, they're brand new. Not the problem.

The tires are < 10k miles, rated for 40k. Not the problem. (Falken)

The tire place recommended a wheel balance. They did one. No help at all.

I have a full size spare tire. I replaced each of the four tires with the spare and rode around, hoping to rule it down to a single wheel being damaged. Symptom did not go away.

Tire place took the stethoscope to the wheels to see if the bearings have begun to wear. "Looks and sounds perfect."

Being out of alignment does not cause this kind of oscillating. Tire place said that, everything I found on google says that too.

WHAT
THE FUCK
ELSE

could cause this?

[Edited on July 19, 2011 at 5:32 PM. Reason : royally pissed off]

7/19/2011 5:22:30 PM

No, but creating a harmonic that coincides with a natural frequency in the steering or suspension might. I'd be willing to bet that maybe you have bad steering components like loose inner tie rod ends or the like that allow somewhat free minor oscillation of the knuckles.

7/19/2011 8:45:16 PM

I too have had this problem, with a set of BF goodriches, which by the way i will never purchase another set of BFGs. Turns out they prodiuced out a bad lot of tires. The tires started out round, but within a few hundred miles, they would randomly develop a lump. The tire place would rebalance the tires, but the vibration stayed. I have replaced all 4 at various points over the last 2 years, all under warranty. Now the warranty has expired, and I have 2 more lumpy tires. Only way you can tell is to either watch it spin up on the balance machine, or jack up the rear end and put it in gear. You can see the wobble, the lumps range from an 1/8 to 1/4 out of round.

7/19/2011 9:41:40 PM

Multiple bent rims can also do this as well, usually the guy balancing the wheels at the tire shop will look for bends but sometimes they get distracted or dont even bother looking at all and just wait for the balancer to tell them where to put the weights on the screen/readout. Did you verify or see they werent bent when you swapped out the spare? Unless its spinning sometimes they are hard to notice and may be too subtle to see when handling.

7/19/2011 11:45:41 PM

Thank for the replies.

I think I can rule out anything related to the wheels or tires. I did not explicitly look for a bent rim while doing the spare swap, but the symptom was completely identical in all four swaps...no worse, no better. That it was so identical really suggests something else, like inner tie rod ends.

I'm taking it to a new shop tonight. I'm just going to say "there's an oscillation" and play dumb, see what they come up with, without preconditioning their response.

7/20/2011 7:35:40 AM

I just had this problem fixed on my car. It was smooth to about 35, then developed a shudder. Tie rod on the passenger side.

if the tie rods are *really* bad you'll be able to move the tire in and out of the wheel well (slightly) when it's jacked up. It's an easy test - just grab the rim or the tire and see if it shakes in and out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20poOCg64mA&NR=1

[Edited on July 20, 2011 at 10:03 AM. Reason : .]

7/20/2011 9:55:14 AM

i believe my tie rods are bad too. not only do i get a vibration around 65 mph that balancing hasn't been able to fix, my steering seems to be loose and i get a lot of vibration in the steering wheel when i got over a bump, like a pot hole or railroad tracks. i'm going to check 'em out tonight with the wiggle test. fortunately they are cheap parts and easy to replace.

7/20/2011 10:40:43 AM

^ Supposing it is the tie rods...I change my own oil, do my own brake work, and can replace alternators and batteries.

Never much more than that. Could an average joe like me figure it out?

7/20/2011 1:54:25 PM

If you can do your own brakes this is a cake walk

7/20/2011 3:03:17 PM

They only charged me $60 to replace the tie rod in a 2002 taurus; and harbor freight wanted $40 for the little tool to do them with. By the time I purchased parts I would have lost money

7/20/2011 5:17:01 PM

^no self respecting mechanic uses a tool other than a hammer to remove outer tire rod ends. Watch the video, it's how we all do it. No matter if it's a GS300 or a Fiesta.

[Edited on July 20, 2011 at 5:54 PM. Reason : lol video...]

7/20/2011 5:52:45 PM

Autozone has the tool for $15 or you could just use a hammer like that guy in the vid did

7/20/2011 5:52:55 PM

They are 100% positive it's the front right wheel bearing.

As I don't have a hydraulic press, I'm gonna have to suck it up and have them do the replacement. Quoted $425. I plainly told them I needed them to do better than that. They quoted $375.

More to come.

7/21/2011 1:07:30 PM

surely you can find someone with a press you can borrow for $beer

[Edited on July 21, 2011 at 1:30 PM. Reason : hell, i pressed in my lower ball joints with a floor jack, a hammer, and the weight of the truck]

7/21/2011 1:29:46 PM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJryEwp86pw
the tool around the 4 minute mark was the one I was talking about - is there a way around that without being straight redneck?

7/21/2011 6:11:28 PM

^Large mouth adjustable wrench would have done the same thing in that case if you had to. Most car tie rods you need at least a BFH/pickle fork or ball joint puller to pull off the old one, both of which you can rent for free from the parts store.

7/21/2011 9:47:17 PM

Either zxappeal or I can probably do that bearing for cheaper. Shoot me a pm

7/22/2011 11:16:56 PM

Thanks for the offers, but I live in MD.

Bearing is replaced. They threw in a wheel alignment. Maybe it was built into the price, dunno.

Only problem is the damn steering wheel isn't centered...in six alignments on this car, at six different shops, they have never been able to do a wheel alignment with a centered steering wheel...going back tomorrow to get it fixed.

7/24/2011 6:52:33 PM

i checked my tie rod end links this weekend. they are fine. i'm not sure what my issue is.

7/25/2011 8:20:42 AM