ooohal9000

Hi everybody, was wondering if any of you know the likely cause to my car problem: whenever I get above 70 or 75 mph there is a slight shaking that I can feel on the steering wheel, the seat and floor, basically the entire car starts to shake. It's nothing violent but certainly noticable. It gets worse the faster I go. If I'm going say 65 or below it drives perfectly, straight as an arrow, with no shakes or abnormal vibrations. I've purchased my LS400 a month ago with 92,000 miles, tires look good; great car, once this problem is resolved I will be all the more happier. I'm by no measure a skilled mechanic but I do enjoy working on my car (changed air filter, engine oil, replaced cabin filter with custom HEPA filter, silly things like that) maybe this is something I can fix myself. Thanks

ewenpg

I believe it needs a wheel alignment. It is kind of hard to do without the right expensive equipment. A bunch of places do it at varying prices but I did realise that Firestone do a wheel alignment for life (ie. You go in every so often to get it tweaked). That is about $160. Lexus dealerships will do it as well. Good luck!
Ewen

Rey

Replace lower ball joints and tie rod ends. Check all bushings. Strut rod or lca bushings might be shot too or wheels might be unbalanced. Im also trying to trace a slight vibration at that speed after replacing lower ball joints and tie rods ends.

trukn1

Welcome to CL. For future questions please post what year LS you have in order to get faster responses. Now in reference to your 97...

Lexus' are particularly very sensitive as well as hard to balance. While your tires may look fine, sounds like your car may be in desperate need of a good balance.
Of course, to be on the safe side, make sure that all lugs are tightened, and would be a good idea to have a mechanic check your ball joints. You can do a (home) test. Jack the car up to take pressure off the individual tire with the parking brake off, grab the wheel at the 3 and 9 position, and then at the 12 and 6 position and wigglefirst left to right and then top to bottom. There should be no play(no wiggle) when this is done. Repeat for each tire. If there is play, you will probably need ball joints soon. This is a common problem with the LS, it does eat up some ball joints.
As far as your tires are concerned, like I stated before, Lexus is extremely sensitive to balance and the LS, being a heavy car, is no exception. You need to find a shop that has a HUNTER 9700 (AKA ROADFORCE BALANCE) MACHINE. Of what is on the market today, this is probably the best machine to use to balance our cars being that they are sooo sensitive. My best bet is that you probably just need to have the tires put thru a good balance.

For other questions, topics, etc, try throwing the key words in the search feature as well. You will find that alot of your concerns may have beenm adddressed many times before.

PureDrifter

iTrader: (10)

FIRST thing to do is to have all 4 wheels rebalanced. find a shop that uses a Hunter "Road Force" style balancer. the LS is very sensitive to wheel balance.

ooohal9000

Thanks for quick replies, I'll definatly get it balanced with the Roadforce machine and have the transmission flushed, i have a feeling it's still on the original trans fluid.

DietrichB

Don't forget it's very common to have rims that are bent oval from being bumped into curbs or potholes. On used cars you have no idea the things a car may have been run over. When I bought my LS at 95K miles, it was in great shape, obviously very well cared for, not even a door ding, but it had two bent rims. Hard to see the bend unless you find a shop that will let you watch it spin on the balancer. Rotating the tires front to back can give a hint about possible bad rims, as it's usually pretty easy to tell when a vibration moves from front to back.

PureDrifter

iTrader: (10)

if the wheels zero out the trans mount may be dead, so about $40 in parts and half an hour of DIY time.

Suneet

YOu can DIY the tranny mount replacement? I thought it was a pretty difficutlt job.

steveski

Didn't realize the tranny mount can cause vibration. I have a slight vibration at 75 and it gets worse when I accelerate. However it is not there on all surfaces (black road there - concrete not there). I had all wheels/tires balanced on a hunter road force and they are fine.

LiCelsior

iTrader: (32)

i get vibrations from 65+ gonna get shocks changed soon since my rears are dead . hopefully that fixes the vibrations and the engine mounts and tranny mounts could cause vibrations.

Suneet

I don't know that changing the shocks will change vibrations.

There's also something that can lead to subtle vibrations, which isn't discussed much here, and that is tire choice. I used to run a set of Bridgestone Turanzas, which were amazing. Very quite, and wet/dry traction was GREAT. They also cost a pretty penny at $200 a pop.

I then switched to Yokohama Avid V4s, at about $70 a pop, and to this day am still dissapointed. They were first balanced on a Hunter machine, but not a road force machine.. and showed perfect balance. I had terrible vibration, took them back, and they were COMPLETELY out of balance. The shop had to put like another 8g of wheel weights just to get them balanced.

Vibrations didn't go away. I took them to a specialty alignment shop, and they were balacned with a road force balancing machine (this shop is also a test bed for Hunter machines, so they have the latest machines bfore they are even out).. and MOST vibratiosn were gone.. but I still get very subtle vibrations, that I notice only on long drives. After driving for like an hour, my legs feel all tingly from the subtle vibrations I feel in the pedals.

I think that the tires I bought just sucked. I can't wait to switch them out.

steveski

You bring up a good point with tires. This is the first time I have ran tires other than Michelins. I have Nitto NT 555's and they have been great. Since all my suspension parts are not worn it could be the tires since the vibrations are not consistent - changes on different surfaces.

PureDrifter

iTrader: (10)

trans mount is the easy one, motor mounts are the one that are a real PITA.

i have no comment on my old Yokos, i had them on my '95 for a grand total of 5 months before it was totalled
good tires during the brief stint tho, but i never saw any treadwear nor did i push them.


im currently on General Exclaim UHP 245/45/18