Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General Troubleshooting Could my struts be the culprit this whole time?

I put new struts on mine and have not had the vibration since then. My front end dove badly though, and I think that was most of the problem.

jc-aimhigher,

How did your vibration issue sort out? I am having the same problem now and wouldn't mind a little more insight.

I'm getting an overall vibration in the car above 55mph and violent shaking in the steering wheel when applying the brakes. I just did the brakes recently that seemed to fix the problem for a thousand miles until the vibrations started coming back... ~sigh~

I believe jc-aimhigher is out of country. Helping to protect our freedom.

mine was cured by having an alignment done. of course, i have to take it back in to get it realigned under warranty. 6k mile warranty and the car has the shakes like a virgin on her wedding night at 5k miles.

i maybe time to replace all the bushings. i'll wait for the warmer spring weather for that though...

That is correct, I'm forwarding this thread link to him for his viewning. Don't expect a quick response though as he is very, very far away right now.

My limited experience with vibrations that shake the sreering wheel while braking have proven to be none other than rotor warp caused by Over and/or Uneven wheel nut torque. My duratec Mystique had new rotors, a new tie rod end and it still vibrated/ shook while braking at highway speeds.

Several weeks ago this topic was raised. The solution proved to be front wheel retorquing to as close to 75 ft/lbs as possible. It's sometimes as simple as that. In my case, the vibrations have completly disappeared after just 2 weeks of daily use. In the current case the tires may also be out of balance and ppossibly a wheel could have excessive runout. This is a cheap fix and should be tried before spening big bucks on possibly unnecessary repairs.

Our vehicles are equipped with rotors that are extrordinarily sensitive to uneven and excessive wheel nut torque. When you re-torque the wheel nuts be sure to clean the wheel holes with a very slightly oily rag so when they are torqued the wheel nuts will all slide to an even torque on each stud and don't go beyond 75 ft/lbs.

Regards!

John