My ride has been feeling terrible ever since my road trip.

[DominicJE]

Hi guys, ever since I went on my last road trip to Canada in July (about 4000 miles) my car has not felt the same. It feels jittery and wobbly (tires) could they be unbalanced?

I just had them do a tire rotation and balance at oil change about a week ago but maybe I should bring it back and see if they are unbalanced? How could I go about checking that? It feels very wobbly and jittery. On the trip I did hit a lot of bad roads such as New York with all of those small holes and such that I couldn't avoid.

PS: I only have 17,000 miles on the car and tires. The energy saver tires (Michelin)

 

[homeofstone]

Have the tires checked for damage and balanced by a Michelin tire dealer. If you hit a lot of holes have the alignment checked and have the tire dealer check and make sure you do not have a bent wheel. Several years ago my wife hit a hole and bent a front wheel on the back side of the wheel where it did not show.

 

[DominicJE]

That's what I was afraid of, a bent wheel. I'll have tire kingdom or someone check it out and hopefully that's not the case.

 

[mikec]

Another possibility though fairly rare (fortunately) is loose wheel nuts. If they weren't torqued properly they can get loose after a while and the whole tire+rim wobbles on the studs. That mangles the studs and can damage the rim at best, at worst of course the whole shebang can separate from the car! One by one the lug nuts get "flung" off (and will dent/smash pretty much whatever or whoever they hit) when this happens as well. Look at your car from the back and front and see if any wheel seems to be tipped oddly compared to its twin on the other side of the car.

An unbalanced and/or bent rim will typically cause vibrations that increase as you speed up. Loose wheel nuts will make vibrations that don't seem to correlate with speed as much and sometimes will be worse when making turns in one direction and better when turning the other direction. It's also possible one (or more) of the balance weights didn't get properly attached to the rim and has since been flung off the car too. That's fairly common actually.

Loose suspension parts (especially ball joints on the tie rod assemblies) will also cause wandering and/or vibrations. Often the vibrations will be minimal until a certain speed is reach, then the vibration amplitude jumps up at that critical speed and stays high until you've almost stopped.

With the car on a lift, all of these are quick and easy to check. A dealer or your tire/suspension shop should be able to do this.

mike c.

 

[Aquineas]

While I hope you don't have a bent wheel, I've found it really hard to find a good wheel balancer. I finally found one near my parents' home in Houston, and they took one look at the job done by someone prior and stated, "They only balanced one side of the wheel!!"

 

[Jbo]

Had psimular issue on road trip...had all four rebalanced..problems...had thrown one weight on pot hole and tire store said each wheel was off..all for 20 bucks

 

[DominicJE]

Figures, I went to the dealer and they pretty much think I'm crazy they test drove and don't feel ANYTHING supposely and they checked my rims, and tires and etc... and they charged me $52!!! On the paper it said they "Road forced" my tires, what on earth does that mean?
It seems even at 5 miles (without my foot on the pedal) i feel a little wobble / bumpy type feeling.

I still feel the issue, it's more like I feel a "little" wobble/bumpy effect on any road - even flat ones.. I don't recall my car feeling like this at all. Also I feel the ground a lot more (meaning my feet feel it when they are on the pedal or the floor).

Is it possible that maybe this is a tire issue? I only have 17,000 miles though. Are the Michelin tires known for this at around this many miles?
I don't know what to do at this point, unless try another dealer or something.

I tried tire kingdom but they said that my dealer is the one to go to since it's under factory warranty which is why I went to the dealer.

 

[homeofstone]

Figures, I went to the dealer and they pretty much think I'm crazy they test drove and don't feel ANYTHING supposely and they checked my rims, and tires and etc... and they charged me $52!!! On the paper it said they "Road forced" my tires, what on earth does that mean?
It seems even at 5 miles (without my foot on the pedal) i feel a little wobble / bumpy type feeling.

I still feel the issue, it's more like I feel a "little" wobble/bumpy effect on any road - even flat ones.. I don't recall my car feeling like this at all. Also I feel the ground a lot more (meaning my feet feel it when they are on the pedal or the floor).

Is it possible that maybe this is a tire issue? I only have 17,000 miles though. Are the Michelin tires known for this at around this many miles?
I don't know what to do at this point, unless try another dealer or something.

I tried tire kingdom but they said that my dealer is the one to go to since it's under factory warranty which is why I went to the dealer.

Many times a wobble as you described is caused from a bad belt in a radial tire. Take it to a Michelin tire dealer and have them check all the tires. Tires are not under the vehicles warranty, the tires have their own warranty as stated in the manual.

 

[Mark_888]

... and they charged me $52!!! On the paper it said they "Road forced" my tires, what on earth does that mean?

That means your tires got rebalanced using the road force method, which is the preferred balancing method if they know what they are doing.