Steering vibration after tire rotation ...
Vaibhav A. Diwadkar
My fiancee just had the 12K servicing done on our SL2 with Saturn of
Macon. Part of the servicing involved having the tires rotated. Following
rotation we have noticed that the steering wheel vibrates appreciably
at > 60 mph and the steering has developed a rightward drift. The
vibration was enough for me to call back Saturn of Macon. The head
of their maintainence division there was of the opinion that this
was probably NOT an alignment or tire balance problem, but was caused by
differential wear on the tires and that tire rotation accentuated
this differential wear leading to vibration. His remedy was to
rotate the tires back. This strikes me as a quick fix. We will be
taking the car back in for him to have a look but I thought I would
sample opinions on this group.
I can't believe that the differential wear on tires of a 9 month
old car can be great enough to cause appreciable vibration following
tire rotation.
I should state that the guy at Saturn of Macon was quite helpful and
interested in alleviating the problem so this is not a crib against
him.
I was wondering if others in the group have had similar experiences
after tire rotation and if this is the norm. We did not have any such
problems after we rotated tires at 6K.
I would be interested in any comments people might have ...
Regards, - Vaibhav.
----------------------------------------
Vaibhav A. Diwadkar
Dept. of Psychology
Vanderbilt University
diwa...@ctrvax.vanderbilt.edu
----------------------------------------
"..scientific curiosity should be encouraged, but it is
not an absolute value."
Noam Chomsky, "Psychology & Ideology"
----------------------------------------
Jon Yiesla
>Hi all ...
>
>My fiancee just had the 12K servicing done on our SL2 with Saturn of
>Macon. Part of the servicing involved having the tires rotated. Following
>rotation we have noticed that the steering wheel vibrates appreciably
>at > 60 mph and the steering has developed a rightward drift. The
>vibration was enough for me to call back Saturn of Macon. The head
>of their maintainence division there was of the opinion that this
>was probably NOT an alignment or tire balance problem, but was caused by
>differential wear on the tires and that tire rotation accentuated
>this differential wear leading to vibration. His remedy was to
>rotate the tires back. This strikes me as a quick fix. We will be
>taking the car back in for him to have a look but I thought I would
>sample opinions on this group.
>
>
them balanced did they remove them from the car to do the balancing? It is my opinion that removal and spin balancing is a
better way to do it. Finally, check to see how many weights are on each side of the tire. I had a situation with my wife's
Ford. After having a rotate and supposedly rebalancing done, I noticed a marked shimmey in the front. Ford said that
it had been too long between rotates and the tires had some cupping. I took the care to a Goodyear dealer to see about
new tires. To make a long story short he took it for a test drive and looked at the tires. Then he showed me where Ford
had "apparently" done a bad job of balancing the tires. They had more then one weight on each side of the tires. I watched
as Goodyear spun them up and could see that they were not in balance. After they removed the weights and redid them
the car ran perfectly. Just a thought, Jon
John McGing
>Hi all ...
>My fiancee just had the 12K servicing done on our SL2 with Saturn of
>Macon. Part of the servicing involved having the tires rotated. Following
>rotation we have noticed that the steering wheel vibrates appreciably
>at > 60 mph and the steering has developed a rightward drift. The
>vibration was enough for me to call back Saturn of Macon. The head
>of their maintainence division there was of the opinion that this
>was probably NOT an alignment or tire balance problem, but was caused by
>differential wear on the tires and that tire rotation accentuated
>this differential wear leading to vibration. His remedy was to
>rotate the tires back. This strikes me as a quick fix. We will be
>taking the car back in for him to have a look but I thought I would
>sample opinions on this group.
>I can't believe that the differential wear on tires of a 9 month
>old car can be great enough to cause appreciable vibration following
>tire rotation.
>I should state that the guy at Saturn of Macon was quite helpful and
>interested in alleviating the problem so this is not a crib against
>him.
>I was wondering if others in the group have had similar experiences
>after tire rotation and if this is the norm. We did not have any such
>problems after we rotated tires at 6K.
>I would be interested in any comments people might have ...
>Regards, - Vaibhav.
>----------------------------------------
>Vaibhav A. Diwadkar
>Dept. of Psychology
>Vanderbilt University
>diwa...@ctrvax.vanderbilt.edu
>----------------------------------------
>"..scientific curiosity should be encouraged, but it is
>not an absolute value."
> Noam Chomsky, "Psychology & Ideology"
>----------------------------------------
I had exactly those symptoms. But at the 18,000 (well, 21,500 <g>)
service they rotated again and things are fine. Not sure if the rotation
put things back to the previous configuration, but things are now very
nice at 65+ speeds.
John
--
------------------------------------------------------------------
jmc...@access.digex.net Nobody knows the troubles I've seen
JOHN.PF on GEnie Team OS/2 .... and nobody cares!
Grant M. Smith
>>
>>My fiancee just had the 12K servicing done on our SL2 with Saturn of
>>Macon. Part of the servicing involved having the tires rotated.
Following
>>rotation we have noticed that the steering wheel vibrates appreciably
>>at > 60 mph and the steering has developed a rightward drift. The
>>vibration was enough for me to call back Saturn of Macon. The head
>>of their maintainence division there was of the opinion that this
>>was probably NOT an alignment or tire balance problem, but was caused
by
>>differential wear on the tires and that tire rotation accentuated
>>this differential wear leading to vibration. His remedy was to
>>rotate the tires back. This strikes me as a quick fix. We will be
>>taking the car back in for him to have a look but I thought I would
>>sample opinions on this group.
>>
>>
that they are out of balance. Also, if you had
>them balanced did they remove them from the car to do the balancing? It
is my opinion that removal and spin balancing is a
>better way to do it. Finally, check to see how many weights are on each
side of the tire. I had a situation with my wife's
>Ford. After having a rotate and supposedly rebalancing done, I noticed a
marked shimmey in the front. Ford said that
>it had been too long between rotates and the tires had some cupping. I
took the care to a Goodyear dealer to see about
>new tires. To make a long story short he took it for a test drive and
looked at the tires. Then he showed me where Ford
>had "apparently" done a bad job of balancing the tires. They had more
then one weight on each side of the tires. I watched
>as Goodyear spun them up and could see that they were not in balance.
After they removed the weights and redid them
>the car ran perfectly. Just a thought, Jon
When I bought my new 95SL2 I had vibration problems at around the same
speed. This was corrected at the dealer by realignment and rebalancing
the tires. Then at 9k miles I had the tires rotated at a garage. The
steering again had tremendous vibration at about the same speed. The
garage told me that my belts were separating and to take it back to the
dealer. The dealer rebalanced the tires and it has been fine since.