Hi Guys,

 

I was hoping for a bit of advice please.

 

This has been going on for a little while now but basically I have a tyre rumble a low speeds driving around town and it wobbles when I turn the wheel slightly left or right at 70mph on the dual carriageway and continues to rumble at that speed too.

 

It's not tyre balancing and it's not a defective tyre either, that's been ruled out.

 

Any suggestions as to what the cause could be please guys?

 

 

Many thanks,

Tom

Wheel bearing?

39 minutes ago, AnnoyingPentium said:

Wheel bearing?

I thought that, ticks all the boxes except it doesn't have any play when you rock the wheel side to side, up and down.

11 minutes ago, Tomjones1995 said:

I thought that, ticks all the boxes except it doesn't have any play when you rock the wheel side to side, up and down.

 

They can get noisy without any play.

19 minutes ago, Tomjones1995 said:

I thought that, ticks all the boxes except it doesn't have any play when you rock the wheel side to side, up and down.

 

Mine started to go with a low level rumble at random speeds. Don't rule it out entirely.

Edited 4 April, 20224 yr by AnnoyingPentium

Could it still be a wheel bearing if it's smooth when you spin the wheel while stationary on jack stands and it's smooth?

 

I was thinking that it may be just starting to go and perhaps that's why it's so smooth when spun on jack stands and perhaps at speed and all the cornering etc it's got much more pressure on it?

7 minutes ago, Tomjones1995 said:

Could it still be a wheel bearing if it's smooth when you spin the wheel while stationary on jack stands and it's smooth?

 

I was thinking that it may be just starting to go and perhaps that's why it's so smooth when spun on jack stands and perhaps at speed and all the cornering etc it's got much more pressure on it?

 

Yes sometimes they can still feel smooth when spun but it's a different matter when the weight of the car is on them.

2 minutes ago, TMB said:

 

Yes sometimes they can still feel smooth when spun but it's a different matter when the weight of the car is on them.

Yeah that's what I thought would perhaps be the reason why. The car is 17yrs old now too and on 178k on the original front shock absorbers too. 

 

They don't seem to bounce more than once with a bounce test but again as with the bearings, it must be bouncing when driving at speed and with the cornering. They don't seem excessively worn but given the mileage and age of them I'm wondering would they play a part in bouncing the wheel like a basketball without me noticing do you think?

 

Thanks again to you both for the help

6 minutes ago, Tomjones1995 said:

I'm wondering would they play a part in bouncing the wheel like a basketball without me noticing do you think?

 

I doubt it.

I'll just stick with the wheel bearing then and see where that takes me. Thanks for all your help

 

I'll be sure to post an update once it's been into the garage

I had a noise that I thought was a wheel bearing,

 

I had a check done but the garage said that they could detect no fault in the wheel bearings.

I also had the wheel balance checked, nothing wrong.

 

At the last MOT I had an advisory; 

• Nearside Rear Road wheel slightly distorted (5.2.2 (c) (i))

I ditched that wheel and replaced it and since there has been silence, problem solved. 

22 minutes ago, totoro said:

I had a noise that I thought was a wheel bearing,

 

I had a check done but the garage said that they could detect no fault in the wheel bearings.

I also had the wheel balance checked, nothing wrong.

 

At the last MOT I had an advisory; 

• Nearside Rear Road wheel slightly distorted (5.2.2 (c) (i))

I ditched that wheel and replaced it and since there has been silence, problem solved. 

 

So was that a buckle they were suggesting?

3 minutes ago, Tomjones1995 said:

 

So was that a buckle they were suggesting?

 

Yes,  it was not that visible but enough to cause the noise. wheel balancing checks radial balance not 'side to side' so doesn't pick it up.

6 minutes ago, totoro said:

 

Yes,  it was not that visible but enough to cause the noise. wheel balancing checks radial balance not 'side to side' so doesn't pick it up.

I see.

 

I do have a couple of buckled alloys myself but was told that they could be balanced out.

 

I would imagine the buckles could be causing the vibration and could also accelerate wheel bearing wear too I would imagine?

 

And potentially damage tyres or not do you think?

 

Thanks for the help,

Tom

Buckled wheel won't be doing any favours, if they're not bad put them both on the back and provided the current rear wheels aren't in the same state putting them to the front should tell you if the noise was the (previous front) wheels/tyres.

 

When moving the wheels around take a good look at the whole of the wheel inside and out and the tyre tread all round the tyre and the inside and outside tyre walls, do this for all four wheels and tyres.  Check all the tyre pressures too.  If they're two, three or four different makes or models of tyres and ages that can sometimes add fun too, especially if there's an odd size of wheel or tyre in there too, so you could also check the numbers on all the wheels match.

 

If you put up some side on shots of the wheels (not in portrait please) and tyres of anything you're not sure about it might help.

 

6 minutes ago, nta16 said:

Buckled wheel won't be doing any favours, if they're not bad put them both on the back and provided the current rear wheels aren't in the same state putting them to the front should tell you if the noise was the (previous front) wheels/tyres.

 

When moving the wheels around take a good look at the whole of the wheel inside and out and the tyre tread all round the tyre and the inside and outside tyre walls, do this for all four wheels and tyres.  Check all the tyre pressures too.  If they're two, three or four different makes or models of tyres and ages that can sometimes add fun too, especially if there's an odd size of wheel or tyre in there too, so you could also check the numbers on all the wheels match.

 

If you put up some side on shots of the wheels (not in portrait please) and tyres of anything you're not sure about it might help.

 

 

I usually replace the tyres in pairs so on the front I have Uniroyal rainsport 5, and on the back I have Avon ZV7.

 

Back ones are worn down just onto the wear markers now and the fronts have plenty of tread. Pressure is 30psi in rear and 35psi in front.

 

I have moved them around from corner to corner.

 

To put it briefly....

 

New front tyres (Uniroyal) in December. Wheels vibrated before tyre change and after.

 

I assumed it was a buckled alloy so kept the tyre on the same corner and swapped offside alloys front to back so all tyres in sane position just swap alloys around. Vibrating stayed same for about a week then it got major bad, whole car vibrating over 40mph.

 

Took it back again keeping all tyres in same place and using the full size spare in boot swap offside front alloy for the boot one.

Still vibrating very bad.

 

Last thing I've done was then swap the two wheels around offside front for nearside front and a dramatic improvement but only to the point that it was in the beginning.

 

So essentially I've come full circle to beginning with some vibration which I've had for a while to a random load of vibration from the offside front tyre and then once swapped it's now back to some vibration with wobbling at speed.

 

 

Sorry for the lengthy post, but that's what I've done so far. It appears to me something has damaged the offside front tyre to cause the extreme shaking over 40mph that I had and all the vibration could be just the buckled alloys?

 

 

 

 

 

Sorry I got a bit lost, is this it or have I got it wrong,. -

 

You have been back to the tyre place and they have moved tyres they originally fitted to different wheels (offside front and rear), then used spare wheel as offside front keeping tyres in same position.  I must have this wrong(?), misunderstood(?). 

 

New Uniroyal Rainsport 5 fitted to front in December - wheels (plural) vibrated before and after fitting - were the balance weights changed with tyres or just added to, are there a lot of balance weights?  Surely the tyre fitted would have pointed out to you that your wheels are buckled and he'd have a hard job balancing them rather than he could balance out buckles, what sort of place did you go to?

 

Avon ZV7 on rear - worn down to legal limit of 1.6mm(?) in wet Wales and they were on the rear?

 

35psi front, 30 psi rear - is that usual by the Handbook?

 

So now you have front - Uniroyals, 35psi, plenty of tread (?). - Rear Avons, 30psi worn down to legal limit?  

 

If you have tyre, wheel or brake problems at the rear you feel it through the car but if you have tyre, wheel, suspension, steering problems at the front you will feel it at the front perhaps the effect dampened by the power steering - but it's possible to have problems both front and rear.

 

Some of it might just be your new  tyres and mixing old with new.  New tyres, Uniroyals have been mentioned before, seem now to be very loose at the tread and/or sidewalls and take quite a while to wear in (mine Continentals took at least a 1,000 miles before they didn't feel wobbly and more to settle and I had a set of four).

 

Mixing new deeper less worn tread with older worn tread is one factor, mixing different makes and/or model of tyres is another factor  so you're by a factor of two just with this.

 

Then you have different tyre pressures to different tyres too but also buckled wheel(s) and possibly more,

 

Subject to the condition of your wheels I think IF your Avons are worn down to the legal limit (in wet Wales) then replacing them with new Uniroyal Rainsport 5 of exactly the same model as the front and allowing a reasonable mileage for the tread to wear in, say up to or more than 1,000 miles, and having all four tyres to the Handbook tyre pressures you may find things improve a lot - subject to how buckled your wheels are and how well the wheels have all been balanced.

 

Edited 5 April, 20224 yr by nta16
spelling

7 hours ago, nta16 said:

Sorry I got a bit lost, is this it or have I got it wrong,. -

 

You have been back to the tyre place and they have moved tyres they originally fitted to different wheels (offside front and rear), then used spare wheel as offside front keeping tyres in same position.  I must have this wrong(?), misunderstood(?). 

 

New Uniroyal Rainsport 5 fitted to front in December - wheels (plural) vibrated before and after fitting - were the balance weights changed with tyres or just added to, are there a lot of balance weights?  Surely the tyre fitted would have pointed out to you that your wheels are buckled and he'd have a hard job balancing them rather than he could balance out buckles, what sort of place did you go to?

 

Avon ZV7 on rear - worn down to legal limit of 1.6mm(?) in wet Wales and they were on the rear?

 

35psi front, 30 psi rear - is that usual by the Handbook?

 

So now you have front - Uniroyals, 35psi, plenty of tread (?). - Rear Avons, 30psi worn down to legal limit?  

 

If you have tyre, wheel or brake problems at the rear you feel it through the car but if you have tyre, wheel, suspension, steering problems at the front you will feel it at the front perhaps the effect dampened by the power steering - but it's possible to have problems both front and rear.

 

Some of it might just be your new  tyres and mixing old with new.  New tyres, Uniroyals have been mentioned before, seem now to be very loose at the tread and/or sidewalls and take quite a while to wear in (mine Continentals took at least a 1,000 miles before they didn't feel wobbly and more to settle and I had a set of four).

 

Mixing new deeper less worn tread with older worn tread is one factor, mixing different makes and/or model of tyres is another factor  so you're by a factor of two just with this.

 

Then you have different tyre pressures to different tyres too but also buckled wheel(s) and possibly more,

 

Subject to the condition of your wheels I think IF your Avons are worn down to the legal limit (in wet Wales) then replacing them with new Uniroyal Rainsport 5 of exactly the same model as the front and allowing a reasonable mileage for the tread to wear in, say up to or more than 1,000 miles, and having all four tyres to the Handbook tyre pressures you may find things improve a lot - subject to how buckled your wheels are and how well the wheels have all been balanced.

 

 

Yeah that's not quite right.

 

Basically the previous 2 maybe 3 sets of tyres on the front wobbled before the Uniroyal's were fitted in December.

 

This all started roughly 2 yrs ago when a mechanic swapped the wheels with tyres attached from front to back. I'd never done this before.

 

So since December when I had the Uniroyal's fitted. I basically kept the tyres in the same place and tried swapping in different alloys onto the offside front from different places and it made no difference. But 3 of them have varying amounts of buckle in them so maybe that's all it is. Some minor, some more so.

 

It wobbled badly briefly after swapping the alloys around but not straight away which confuses me. This improved when I swapped the front wheels and tyres around.

 

Apologies if none of this is making much sense,

 

Thanks for the help,

Tom

 

Are you hearing any bearing rumble whilst driving ???

5 minutes ago, Stewartasb said:

Are you hearing any bearing rumble whilst driving ???

 

Intermittent rumble at low speeds and wobble at high speeds and random woo noises associated with bearings yes but as it's intermittent I assumed it may be something else but as the others mentioned, bearings can start intermittently.

 

 

Edited 5 April, 20224 yr by Tomjones1995

My bearing would rumble from 30-40 and fizzle out a little, then from 60 it would come back again.

49 minutes ago, Tomjones1995 said:

 

Intermittent rumble at low speeds and wobble at high speeds and random woo noises associated with bearings yes but as it's intermittent I assumed it may be something else but as the others mentioned, bearings can start intermittently.

 

 

 

It was the 'woo woo' noise that made me think it was a bearing problem, it wasn't.

38 minutes ago, AnnoyingPentium said:

My bearing would rumble from 30-40 and fizzle out a little, then from 60 it would come back again.

 

4 minutes ago, totoro said:

 

It was the 'woo woo' noise that made me think it was a bearing problem, it wasn't.

 

Maybe it's both the start of a bearing and buckled alloys?

 

Because I'm sure the buckle would put more strain on the bearing wouldn't it?

 

 

Tom, sorry I thought you meant you'd changed your wheels around originally and then misread it, so my fault.

 

Generally in my experience wheel bearings aren't intermittent, something else may be adding to the sound and/or making it louder or different sound though.

 

A few questions then.

 

Have you checked front and rear brakes?

 

How does the brake pedal feel when you brake?

 

How does the steering wheel feel when wheels wobble and you hear the sounds - and when braking?

 

And to confirm, what car is this?

 

Are you doing lots of mileage?

 

What size wheels and tyres?

 

Does the noise vary you you turn sharp or on tight bends so one side is loaded with weight more than the other if so which corner.

 

I think, it might be a wheel bearing too but not sure about that more with new tyres on buckled wheels it might be that causing the noise and/or other.

 

Edited 5 April, 20224 yr by nta16

25 minutes ago, nta16 said:

Tom, sorry I thought you meant you'd changed your wheels around originally and then misread it, so my fault.

 

Generally in my experience wheel bearings aren't intermittent, something else may be adding to the sound and/or making it louder or different sound though.

 

A few questions then.

 

Have you checked front and rear brakes?

 

How does the brake pedal feel when you brake?

 

How does the steering wheel feel when wheels wobble and you hear the sounds - and when braking?

 

And to confirm, what car is this?

 

Are you doing lots of mileage?

 

What size wheels and tyres?

 

Does the noise vary you you turn sharp or on tight bends so one side is loaded with weight more than the other if so which corner.

 

I think, it might be a wheel bearing too but not sure about that more with new tyres on buckled wheels it might be that causing the noise and/or other.

 

 

Brakes are okay

 

Pedal is firm and there's no spongyness to it

 

Polo GT TDI same as Fabia Vrs mk1

 

1k a month mileage

 

205/45/16 tyres on 16" VW Montreal alloys

 

If I turn really hard into a left hand bend which would obviously load up the offside side of the car then yes it can occasionally wobble more at those times but don't every time

 

Thanks again,

Tom