I had a bad vibration issue with my 87. It would only start after you hit about 55 or so, it was real bad like yours sounds. I didn't even want to go over 60. I checked everything, tire balance, u-joints, brakes, steering you name it! After about 3 months of checking, it turned out to be the rearend. Don't give up! Just a thought, Good luck.

 

Latest dealings with my Toyota dealer can be found here: https://www.yotatech.com/forums/f2/vibration-steering-wheel-38463/

 

Hey all, i'm joining in here because well this is happening to me too. It started about a month ago for no apparent reason, I can't think of anything I did to cause this shaking. Today I had my 265/70/16 replaced with 4 new yokamo 265/75/16. Unfortunately I still have the same shake above 60. I am going crazy, my mom road in the car and was getting sick, i have a radar detector stuck to my windsheild and it bounces up and down like crazy. I'm thinking I will put my spare on one place go for a drive then switch etc. if not i'll go over to big-o and see what they have to say, maybe they can check the balance of the rim itself?

 

Boy now that sounds so very familiar. Welcome to the club!!! I haven't had time to look into some of the guys' recommendations on here, but rest assured I will just as soon as I have time. The next month or so is going to be hectic as hell for me, and I just honestly don't know when I'll have a day to go sit in a shop. I'll keep everyone posted though and thanks for all of the advice!!!

Matt

 

Quick update for everyone...I had my oil changed on Saturday morning. I didn't have a lot of time, but I tried to convince the shop foreman to let me run it up to speed on their rack. Despite my begging, he wouldn't let me do it. So, I had them rotate the two tires with the largest amount of weights on them (both seem rather excessive, but anyway) to the rear of the truck. The wheel with the most weights is on the passenger rear and the one with the second highest is on the driver's rear. The two that are now on the front each have rather small weights. Bottom line....the vibration is SUBSTANTIALLY better. I was extremely and pleasantly surprised. I was driving 80+ mph on the interstate today and I couldn't believe the difference. I will keep looking into this further as my time permits, but I just wanted to let you guys know this and thank you again for all the help thus far. If I just have to rotate the tires from one side of the truck to the other instead of cross rotating, well then I guess that's what I'll have to do for the time being if it will save my sanity. It may decrease the life of the tires somewhat, but if this amount of improvement remains then I'm sticking put until I can do further research/troubleshooting and/or buy new wheels and tires. Of course troubleshooting first. Thanks again.

Matt

 

Its your wheels/tires then...Matt, nothing else could be it.

 

Good to see your able to drive up to 80 again...
Still trouble shoot the problem thought...
Keep us posted...
And Congrats...

 

craziness man... but at least you are an LSU fan in Alabama!

 

bingo.

 

I had a gut feeling it would be the wheels/tires. I can understand the uncertainty one can have though. After having my original problem tires balanced a few times, I began to second guess myself-especially when two shops said my tires were fine. Fortunately the replacements I bought the first time fixed it.

Glad to hear you have it narrowed down.

 

Thanks! When these tires wear out, I'll just spring for a new set of Tundra wheels and tires. It will be a nice conselation since my wife will be getting a new Sequoia or Armada and I'll be driving my 4Runner for many years to come! Thanks again for all the help. I'll post pics of the two tires now on the rear on Wednesday when I'm off and it's daylight. I'll also post the total weight on each of these two wheels.

Matt

 

UPDATE: So I just got my shocks, struts, rack & pinion, tie rods replaced and there is no more vibration!
The mechanic rebuilt the rack & pinion so I was able to save a ton of money there. It is so nice to be able to go 80 and not feel like I'm shooting an automatic rifle. In all it cost me $1000 to get it all done, but it is so worth it.

 

Awesome! I've been reading this post for a while and I'm glad you got it straightened out. I may follow you in doing all that work since i have the same problem.

 

Hi there.I have not read all the posts but i will recomend reading this website on balancing the wheels on your truck.[I]t is recomended you use a special tool to balance the wheels on the Tacomas and 4Runners...hope it works.http://www.gadgetonline.com/Vibration.htm

 

I have a 4x4 1995 tacoma and at 65 mph it vibrates like crazy. I have 31x10x50 tires on it with plane jane 15" steel wheels. Ive been looking at buying new rims thinking the steel rims are bent causing all this vibration, but now Im not so sure. I do know how you feel and how hard it is to explain to my girlfriend that the vibration is the wheels when I dont really know.

 

a wheel is probably bent.

get your tires balanced.
mine have balancing powder in them, the stuff they use in big rigs

 

See:
- http://www.gadgetonline.com/Vibration.htm

And aftermarket wheels can cause vibration problems on the 3rd gen 4Runners and Tacomas. A buddy of mine has a Tacoma and had similar vibrations, he ended up picking up a set of used stock wheels to replace the aftermarket wheels that came on the truck when he bought it and the vibrations were gone.

 

OH my do I know what your talking about. 1st what type of tires are you running? I have been through 3 sets of bfg AT's and all of them eneded up with a tire or two that went out of balance. I also know for a fact that over 5 sets of these steel wheels that we are familiar with are not balanced at all new. A offroad shop close to my home sold them to different customers and all had the same results. They were sold over a period of a couple months. I have not had the out of balance tire issue with Yoko AT's, Nitto AT's, Interco SSR's, Pro Comp MT's,Cooper STT's. I will not ever purchase BFG AT's again only for this reason. So if you are running those this could be your problem, if not your steelies could be the contributing factor.

Aaron

 

I just got the used silver tundra wheels and tires off of craigslist. This guy had taken them off after about 30k off of his tundra and put on different set of wheels. I was able to walk away with it for $400.00. I was lucky because he only lived about 4mins. away from me woohoo~!

now the ride has improved dramatically because the stock tundra tires are much much softer than my BFG ATs. I still get a slight vibration on certain roads but couldnt tell you how happy the improved ride makes me feel I talked to my mechanic and he's thinking my tierods can be worn out and it also could be my steering rack bushings I do get a bit of play when i turn my wheels. After swapping the wheels I'm starting to think the vibration was caused by combinations of slight problems from each components. I'm gonna try replacing my tierods and steering rack bushings one of these days....

 

Don't know if you still have this truck since this post is so old, but the problem is more than likely the machine the shop is using. My local Firestone owner told me a couple of years ago he had to buy a new $25,000 balancer to do "You guys with the damn Toyotas."

Seems the rims need a special adapter. So if you have the rims that were on the 96 to 02 Runners and Tacomas you may wanna look for somewhere new to get them balanced. I have had mine done a few other places and always had to end up going where I should have gone in the first place. I've even had to turn around a go back when the new guy screws up and uses the normal adapter.

This may not help your issue, but hopefully it will help out someone else running around on stock 16" rims.