Date: Thu, 23 Aug 2001 20:09:07 -0400 From: "R. J. Willow" <rjwillownopsams.com> Subject: Re: Can Misalignment Cause Shimmy?
got the same on my 98 pathfinder......with brand new dunlops......put the tires on a balancer and see if there is any noticable vertical runout (tires/rims out of round) had problems since may....contacted the tire dealer, dunlop, 2 mechanics, etc. had 3 tires out of round.....the tire dealer tried the jerk me around and after a month, he finally gave up and installed 4 new tires.......now I have 4 tires out of round......after dealing with Dunlop, they finally got tired of me and decided to have me go to Sears and have them replace the tires with another brand, but they will only credit me for the tires......mounting,balancing etc. is on me......gonna end up paying $650+ for $450 tires......oh well..... anyway, bottom line: If you have alloy rims, they may be sensitive to match balancing......that means that the inherent high spot on the tire must be matched with the inherrent low spot on the rim...the rim is usually marked with a "dot" or an engraved arrow.....failing that, the valve stem hole may indicate the low spot.....tires are often marked by the manufacturer with stick on or painted on dots.....line up the dots and you should be OK and you problem might be solved for good......if you tires do not have dots anymore or did not have them to begin with (as is my case) you might have to go to a specially equipped Balancing shop and ask to have your tires "match Balanced" it might cost a bit, but if the tires are out of round on the rims this procedure should be the cure......or if you want to take a shot at it, you can simply have the tires rotated on the rims 180 degrees and that may make them a whole lot better if you are lucky. Wyatt Burp <b_veritynopsameja.com> wrote in message news:d4735374.0108231527.6f01a235nopsaming.google.com... > It's always been my understanding that steering wheel shimmy > happened when a wheel (or wheels) was/were out of balance. > But I read the other day that it can be due to misalignment. > (I read this in a Reader's Digest article about keeping your > car in shape, when it casually mentioned that a shimmy means > the car's out of alignment--I took this with a grain of salt.) > > I've had a shimmy from about 45 mph up to about 70 mph--it lessens > at higher speeds--ever since I bought my used car ('98 BMW). > I've posted about this prob. to the BMW NG in the past > and I didn't get much useful feedback, so I thought I'd check > with some other auto groups. Balancing and rotating the wheels > doesn't solve the problem, and the tires are nearly new Dunlops. > The former owner had the same problem with other tires, apparently. > Anybody have any ideas what the problem could be. My dealer > says it couldn't be bushings because this model didn't have > problem bushings like some of the other BMWs. I'd just like > some more info from some of you guys who might know before I > go somewhere to get the problem looked into. Thanks a bunch! > > -- > WB
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