JEFF_67COUGAR

My 97 4Runner has a vibration in the steering wheel at 60 to 65mph. It doesn't do it all of the time so I don't think it is a wheel balance problem. She has 76k miles on her currently. I am thinking it might be worn out struts. If so what brand does everyone like? Can they be changed by a home mechanic?

Thanks for the help.

Jeff

denverbikeguy

Some things...

Make sure your tires are inflated to recommended pressure.
Check the bearings, repack if necessary
Check your CV boots for cracks/leaks

I've not heard of worn out struts causing a vibration at specific speeds, but I won't rule it out either. Usually that happens however with one of the parts that rotate...

vmaxjohn

Sounds like a wheel balance problem. If nescisary, have the fronts road force balanced on a Hunter 9700. Very good machine!

Shocks can cause things like this, it's actually the tire bouncing while going down the road. This is very dangerous when braking! You can rule this out by jumping on each end of the bumper and making the car bounce. You want only 1 or 2 bounces when you jump off, no more.

Don't feel too bad, my truck came with 'trailmaster' crap tires, and they suck all over the place. They shimmy going down the road at what ever speed ya like. Good luck!

keisur

...and if your wheels are the lug centric ones (alloys) make sure the place that balances them uses the Haweka adapter to go along with the Hunter 9700.

DavidO06

Do you know of any place that balances them with this? The people at Discount Tire told me that their lugcentric plate wouln't work on my wheels becuase the threads have a diff. pitch than my lug nuts.

keisur

Typical of Dickscount tires. they'll try everything, remounting the tires 90, 180, and 270 degrees from the original mounting and stuff like that and then they'll tell you that your tires are out of round and there's nothing that can be done. wow! now there's a smart guy, they are the ones that caused them to be out of round. well, enough of my outbursts.

You can call around to different shops and ask if they have the hunter 9700 and the haweka adaters and ask if they can balance a lug centric wheel. If they don't know what you are talking about then just hang up. I have to call everywhere around here. I think you can go to the Hunter site and search for shops that use the machine in your area. Gadget's Site has alot of good info and links for this stuff.

Dickscount Tires has the machines they just don't know how to use them properly, they show up in the GSP9700 Search as having those machines.