Sponsored by The Tire Rack

[sturgis]

Got rid of my runflats and ever since I've had a shimmy around 47mph. had them rebalanced, no luck. Then went back again they tried twice and they called me in the back to show me that my rim was bent.

Apparently with the run craps they are so hard that they tracked straight and no shimmy?

So I take the rim to a wheel shop (wheel fix it) and pay to get it straightened. does this fix the problem? NOPE! so I come back again and drop it off. When I come back my car is still in the air, why? b/c the tech needs to show me something. we do the same test as before. put the rim and tire on the balancing machine and hold a screwdriver steady so he can point out that my tire is out of round. although I swear I can see a tiny and I mean tiny bit of play in the rim itself, however there is more play in the tire. so000 I get a new tire had it mounted yesterday and guess what. still got the shimmy.

so I have no idea what the problem is now...

I then pulled the rims off and cleaned any rust off the hub's with a wire wheel, and threw two front wheel/tires from my bro's 335 on and after taking it for a drive still had the same problem.

so I'm guessing the problem is elsewhere.

WHAT IS CAUSING THE SHIMMY!???? THIS IS DRIVING ME NUTS!

Any help will be sincerely appreciated! Thanks in advance!

[boostm3]

Are these your stock rims?

[Lester]

If the vibration changes with speed, then it is wheel balance. If it is noticable even at low speeds, then it could be a bent wheel, or warped brake rotor.

[Dackelone]

Did your tire shop ever rotate the TIRES on the RIM 90' or 180's ???

The tires will have a colored DOT, This dot should be 180' from the valve stem. The dot denotes the heavy spot of the tire. When the dot is not in the right spot on the rim it will cause a shimmy. No matter how well the wheel is balance.

Also... is your shop using the correct wheel weights? Inside and outside? ...the inner wheel lip. Some shops will only use one weight. Have they measure the overall circumfrance of each tire? Maybe one is defective.

Ever wonder why Yoko and Conti use those packaging tapes - in the tire circumfrance. That is why. For quality control.

Worse comes to worse... have the shop put another set of wheels on your car - to show you it is not their tires. I suspect you have a bad tire or mounted tire.

[sturgis]

So after putting my brother's wheel and tires on both fronts I switched back to my own rims. the shimmy was there at 43-44mph with both sets but.....

on my way home today coming down a bridge right by my house I was holding that 43-44mph speed and zero shimmy. the only difference is that it was raining. since I think its a harmonic vibration thats causing the issue, not a wheel/tire balance could the water on the road have made a difference by absorbing the excess vibration?.

Also, I know the tires are asymetrical but, they should be directional right? I looked at the tread patterns on both of them and they look like they are both Front driverside tires, I was wondering if this could somehow be part of the problem as the shimmy seems worse on my rim/tire setup than when I used my brothers off his 335i which are true.

Thoughts? thanks in advance!

[fancyfl1ght]

Originally Posted by sturgis

Got rid of my runflats and ever since I've had a shimmy around 47mph. had them rebalanced, no luck. Then went back again they tried twice and they called me in the back to show me that my rim was bent.

Apparently with the run craps they are so hard that they tracked straight and no shimmy?

So I take the rim to a wheel shop (wheel fix it) and pay to get it straightened. does this fix the problem? NOPE! so I come back again and drop it off. When I come back my car is still in the air, why? b/c the tech needs to show me something. we do the same test as before. put the rim and tire on the balancing machine and hold a screwdriver steady so he can point out that my tire is out of round. although I swear I can see a tiny and I mean tiny bit of play in the rim itself, however there is more play in the tire. so000 I get a new tire had it mounted yesterday and guess what. still got the shimmy.

so I have no idea what the problem is now...

I then pulled the rims off and cleaned any rust off the hub's with a wire wheel, and threw two front wheel/tires from my bro's 335 on and after taking it for a drive still had the same problem.

so I'm guessing the problem is elsewhere.

WHAT IS CAUSING THE SHIMMY!???? THIS IS DRIVING ME NUTS!

Any help will be sincerely appreciated! Thanks in advance!

Anything else is either luck or pure guess work.

[sturgis]

the have been balanced under load (road force balancing) twice.

The car goes into bmw tomorrow. hopefully they can figure it out.

yes they are stock rims, and yes the tires have been rotated on the rims.

[IDBMW]

You have not mentioned a front end alignment. I would have the alignment checked. Especially since you put other tires and wheels on and it still does it. BMW alignments are a little different so I use the BMW dealer for it.

When I have vibration issues I usually get the wheels balanced then have the front end aligned. I have had to have the tires rebalanced a few times to get it right.

How much does the road force balance cost? My BMW dealer does it but they want $360 to balance all 4 wheels so I did not have it done.

[ptack]

I had a slight vibration once after they had repaired my rear end (due to being hit by a truck). Turned out the new wheel and tire were fine, but the alignment was off even though they had paperwork saying it was perfect. It was visibly toeing and the camber was off.

[Eric@e2design]

just to clear some things up

Just about everyone's rim will be bent in a few places under regular road driving yes both stocks and aftermarket.. no one will notice it unless you're leaking air (you probably will never feel a bent rim and if you do u have a flat anyways..) or your tire guy will let you know that your rim is strangely difficult to balance. Poorly made aftermarket wheels or bad tires will also be very hard to balance although rarely the tire. (and if it is it should be replaced under warranty)

As for the dot mark on the tire is actually suppose to line up with the valve stem. but doesnt really matter since your wheels not truly round anymore after thousands of miles of road use.

weights.. you're probably going to want the stick on weights.. the most accurate way to balance using those is to put on two sets one set being on the inner side against the inside edge of the rim and the other being towards the middle-outter where.. eh basically behind the center piece if we're talking about a 2-3 piece wheel.. there are different ways to do it

Road force balance is more expensive only because of the machine... again not necessary but yah if its affordable or if you get it in a wheel/tire package deal then yay..

if you're feeling a vibration through the steering wheel is it a shaking or pulling? if its pulling you might wana check your alignment as others have suggested. I'd say Hub Ring if you have aftermarket wheels but you've swapped wheels with same results so yah check alignment

[Dackelone]

Sturgis - how clean are your hubs? Have you tried using a wire brush to clean up any surface rust on the face of the hub or on the ring of the hub>? And on your inside wheel hub - make sure they are clean.

The onloy other thing I can think of is that on old Porsche's... Porsche would paint one of their wheel studs YELLOW. This was the stud that the wheel tire valve should go onto. In other words the tire valve lug hole goes on that yellow stud. A lot of shops did not do this... and on the 944 series cars it could cause a minor wheel shake. I do not think BMW does that. At least I have not seen any paint colors on MY hubs.

Let us all know what the outcome is.

[Eric@e2design]

i thought you guys had wheel bolts not studs..

[IZAGLO]

check your rotors....they warp on some cars especially my Honda's(service mgr is the first one to tell ya Honda rotors are crap) and when going a certain speeds will make the rims shimmy when they are getting bad even without braking ...It feels like the wheels are out of balance but it's the warped rotors sometimes and at certain speeds it's worse.

[sturgis]

I cleaned the hubs up with a wire wheel back when I switched out the last rims.

I got a second road force variation done and bmw spent a lot of time and got the numbers down extremely close to zero. .5 and 1.5 i think which is well within tolerances.

went to a third tire shop and was told my tires were out of round again. apparently the goodyears I bought from tire rack are badly out of round, tirerack is being good to me and sending me new tires which I will replace with non goodyears as I have had 4 out of round in the 225 size for the fronts.

I do not think alignment is a possibility because I have a steering wheel shimmy, the car does not pull.

I guess the rotors could be a possibility but it doesn't make sense that it would start happening immediately after I had my tires changed, also I'm sure bmw would have noticed that.

I'll be ordering the new tires tomorrow and with a new set hopefully make some progress. Im wondering if maybe my rear tires have issues too and that is somehow transferring harmonic vibration to the front end? is that even possible? I don't know but will have 4 new tires soon and see where that takes me. I am so sick of this its been going on 3 months already and cost me $300 what a pain in the arse!