Steering wheel vibration

[macRS4]

spikeyboy, if you email the pro-align website they should be able to give you a list of the garages with the gsp9700 machine in your area.

[P_G]

It doesn't have GSP9700 locations on the website anymore which is feckin useless. I can't believe you have to ring pro-align for the info.

As for costs on the GSP9700, depends on who has it. Locally to me Tams tyres have one but when I went to them they damanged all 4 rims with over tightening the centre clamp on to the alloy that left cut marks around the centre bore / wheel nut area (realised days afterward so no recourse) so don't go back there and the other one is at JCT Porsche on the Silverlink but they charged £160 for all 4 wheels to be balanced. I've yet to find another location but if you do, whenever I have had wheel vibrations that standard balancers cannot fix this machine has always sorted it.

There is one other possibility which is the actual tyre itself is slightly mishapen. This happened to a new Good year F1 GSD3 I had. Not noticable to the eye but the GSP9700 showed the elipsoidal tyre up and then minimised its impact by balancing the wheel and positioning to compensate.

[macRS4]

It doesn't have GSP9700 locations on the website anymore which is feckin useless. I can't believe you have to ring pro-align for the info.

You're right P_G, it is useless, but in all fairness to them they got back to me with a list of garages within an hour or so.

Thanks for the review of your wheel rebalancing experience though - I think I'll go with my alternative plan.

I'm not sure if it'll help, spikeyboy, but I found a 2009 list of garages that have the machine on a thread in ttforum - http://www.ttforum.co.uk/forum/viewtopi ... 5&start=15. It might do as a starter, though clearly some are missing because I can't see the Porsche garage that P-G mentioned.

[stu]

[...] Tams tyres have one but when I went to them they damanged all 4 rims with over tightening the centre clamp on to the alloy that left cut marks around the centre bore / wheel nut area[...]

Nearly went there earlier this year specifically to use their Hunter balancer. Glad I didn't!

edit: same experience with the distributors: quick reply when emailed Sales@Pro-Align.co.uk and they tell you who they sold them to.

[spikeyboy101]

Thanks for the list - one was near me - Bentley - rung them up and they want £250 to balance 4 wheels !!!!!!!!!!

Think i will ring some others up and see what they charge.

[aligod78]

Probably no help, but when my "arms were on their last legs" I was getting a bit of random shuddering up front... Replaced the lot and all sorted.

[spikeyboy101]

Every little helps in tracking down the root cause.

Found another garage over in Essex with the gsp9700 - bit better at £76

[toyneg]

Hi Spikeyboy - have you managed to get this resolved?

[spikeyboy101]

nope.

Had the wheels balanced 4 times by 4 differnet places.

Had all the suspension check by 4 differenct places.

Still does it but not as much now, either that or i have got used to it.

Im guessing i must have a slight buckle on one of the wheels to be causing it.

Only way to really check is to swap my 4 wheels with someone else and see it it still does it - if it does then its not the wheels.

[Stoo.]

Have the wheels been on a road force balancer?

Basically it's a balancing machine that applies a force to the tyre to find out where the tyres sidewall stiffness differences are and tries to balance them out.

[spikeyboy101]

PG mentioned this but was unable to find one near me - apart from a Bentley garage but they wanted £100 a wheel !!!!! Rather get them referred for that price.

Plus it was doing it had new tyres fitted and still did it.

[Stoo.]

Drive shaft?

Did you rotate front to rear and see if the vibration moved?

[toyneg]

I had similar symptoms, balancing the wheels seems to help for a while but I keep losing wheel weights (there were about 7 on the NSF) and it brings the problem back, had them done 3 times now. i was told and shown the wheel is slightly out of shape and that was causing it, have now swapped the front wheels to the back and vice versa, seems ok so far.