I'm getting a vibration when travelling between 70-90 km/h. This started after I painted my calipers and did a tire rotation about 2-3 wks ago. I have Bridgestone Turanza EL42 215/55R17 (yes I know they are crap) and they have about 60% or so tread left on them. I'm pretty sure these aren't directional tires, but is it possible that I swapped them to the opposite sides and they had feathering from their life on the other side causing them to vibrate?

Tire pressure on the front driver's side tire was low today (20 lbs or so) but the rest were fine. Filling up all the tire pressures to 40 didn't seem to make any difference.

Should I muck around with changing sides (unfortunately I don't recall the original configuration), or just say to hell with these tires, get rid of them and get a new set of considerably better tires?

Thanks for any advice.

 

Shoot - accidently posted to the wrong forum - please move this to 1st generation sedan forum.

Thanks!

 

Check your sidewalls. A busted belt in the sidewall will bulge a tire, resulting in rolling vibration. Could be out balance as well.

 

But how could this happen after doing a simple rotation? Things were perfect prior.

 

Moved to the wheel/tire section since the 1st gen sedan section would be the wrong place too.

 

Has this been happening for 2-3wks or just started to? A rough hit to the suspension, like a pot hole, can cause a sidewall bulge.

 

2-3 wks, just after the rotation, and it's only getting worse.

 

Just to make sure, are all your lug nuts torqued to spec (80 ft-lbs)?

Does the vibration happen all the time? Could be a unbalanced wheel.

Only when turning? If turning only, could be a wheel bearing.

 

yeah - torqued correctly. I think it may be an unbalanced wheel. But why wouldn't I have noticed this before when the tire was on in the rear (assuming the problematic tire is up front)?

And it only occurs travelling straight at 70-90 km/h. outside of this, there is a vibration, but it is worst at that speed.

 

If it is an unbalanced wheel, not sure why you didn't notice before. The vibration could have been there the whole time but now it's probably exaggerated through the steering rack.

 

This happened to my other car. Tires were not balanced when tires were put on.

Go to a tire shop and have them balance your tires! I don't think it's an alignment issue, but you should have an alignment done every 6-12months anyways!

 

balanced and alignment done - problem still there. Ended up being my passenger front wheel bearing.