98LexSc400

Put the coilovers on weeks ago drove with no problems no vibrations no pulling. I knew the alignment from lowering would eat the tires up but I waited to do it. I put new Falken tires on changed all four about a week ago. The car drove fine no vibrations no pulling. I drove about a 100 miles before going to get the car aligned. I had a friend at a Toyota dealership do it and he let me watch. He got the car in spec. I have -1.2 camber front and -1.6 on the rear. He set the toe in and the caster is 7.8 on the driver and 7.6 on the passenger side. I drove home and noticed the car pulls hard to the right. If you let go of the wheel it quickly changes lanes. I also noticed the steerign wheel vibration like the tires are out of balance after the alignment. I went back to the tire store yesterday and had them all rebalance on the road force machine and they were all slightly off balance. My next stop was back to toyota for the alignment to see if we could fix the pulling. We realigned it and set a camber split more negative on the passenger front to componsate for the pull to the right. Went and tested it and still pulls to the right. We came back and put the car on a second alignment machine to double check the specs and tweaked it some and still have the car in spec. I drove home and the car still pulls right. Now I have the vibration in the wheels again but it seems to be even worse. I was told to swap tires side to side to see if its a tire pull but I don't see how since they didn't pull after lowering, before the alignment but I will try that. The car has 40k miles and new the Tein CST's with the 20" wheels. Anyone have any other suggestions? Is he just not aligning it properly I am just frustrated and unsure what to try.

ixgunxi

I've encountered this problem many times and its still reoccuring. I have 20s" GFG with the TIEN CST. Most likely the problem is that your Wheels might be bent or your air pressure is incorrect. If this is the case...get new wheels. I've bent them and repaired them 3 times already. I've wasted a whole lot of money on new tires. Probably been through 12 tires in the last 2 years. I have considered new 19s or 20s. But will not know until I strip the excess weight by removing overweight audio system components and going to carbon fiber molding. I've heard about a camber kit might resolve this issue but don't really know of anyone that has used this application. My wheels sit at an angle where the inner sidewall of the tire wear and then end up cracking. I'm still waiting for a guru that can figure out this problem. I hope this answers your questions....keep me posted on how you fix your problem.

Thanks
Gun

98LexSc400

I took the car to Sewell to have them check the alignment. They had a senior master tech do it and he said the alignment was off and he corrected it. But the car still pulls. I went back and he told me he swears it is not the alignment it has to be a tire pull. We talk the wheels and flipped them side to side this made the directional tread go the wrong direction but as soon as I drove it there was no more pull. My next stop was to discount tire. I told them the problem and they tried to install a new passenger front tire thinking it was causing the tire pull. That did not fix it. They installed the old passenger front tire on the drivers side thinking the drivers tire was bad and pushing the car that did not fix it. Now they think it is a rear tire so I go today to get a new one on. I am having my doubts but I will let them try that. As for the rims they aren't bent and they have little to no run out on the balancer so I don't think they are the cause. I am going to keep trying.

intdiamond

iTrader: (2)

Good luck and post up your results...

hipendicul

If your using coil overs, make sure that your car is level. I may be wrong but your caster shouldn't be off from left to right, and it may be from your car not sitting level or maybe something is bent.

Take the car to a good alignment shop. Pepboys, Lexus and goodyear don't count. You may have to sit in the car while they do final alignment...

And Lexus's and Toyotas are really sensitive to wheels shaking. Take the wheels back off and put them back on in a different position (I rotate the wheel one lug) and re-torque the wheels down in a star pattern.

Good luck..

Pearlpower

iTrader: (2)

Brings back so many memories. Such a hassle, hope they find a solution for your shortly. Keep us posted.

curt248

I'm having somewhat similar problems. I put on 19inch 9.5 width wheels all around and 255/35 fronts and 275/30 rears (both tires and wheels brand new from the tire rack). At first the front wheels rubbed so I put the stock front wheels on until I could get spacers. There was no problem with shaking.

I got 5mm H and R spacers with new studs and had lexus put them on. Immediately, my steering wheel shook at 30mph up to 65mph. It was pretty violent. The steering wheel moved back and forth about an inch rapidly.

I noticed that there were no wheel weights on the right front wheel. Lexus also said I had some play in the inside right front tie rod. There was about 7mm at the outer edge of the tire. I did not have problems before the front and rear wheels were installed though. I'm assuming that the tie rod play was there before the wheels were put on.

I assumed the shaking was coming from the lack of a wheel balance of the right front wheel. I switched out the right front wheel with a stock wheel and tire. The shaking was less but the car still had some shaking and it was almost like the rear tires developed some shake as I could feel a shake in the car at times without the steering wheel moving back and forth.

I proceeded to get all 4 wheels and tires balanced. The car drove much better but still has a shake at 40mph to 60mph. The shake is less, about 1/4 to 1/2 inch. I also don't feel much shake in the car either.

What could this be???

The car is at the lexus dealer as we speak. I gave them all 4 of my old wheels too to help diagnose the problem.

I also had a 4 wheel alignment on the Hunter Digital alignment rack with all 4 new wheels on (including the 2 fronts that were rubbing at the time) before any of these problems occured.

Could it be the spacers? Has anyone experienced a similar problem?

Do larger tires 255/35/19 vs the stock 245/40/18's on the front make a difference?

98LexSc400

I spent lots of setting the coilovers and dialing them in until the car was exactly the same height from side to side with the rear sitting slightly higher than the front. I used different points on the car to check the height I used the center line of the fenders front and rear to the ground. I also used the body lines at the bottom of the fenders where they met the rocker panels to double check the heights at a different point. I even measured it like Lexus does in the factory manual by the center of the bolt on the lower control arm to ground. I always drove the car after each adjustment to make sure everything was settled. It was a pain to do all this but I wanted to make sure it was right. As for suspension components the car has 45k on it now and everything is still tight, as tight as SC factory suspension goes at least.

The wheels I have use a hub centric ring that is plastic not a fan of this setup really. When I go to discount tire today to replace the rear tire to try and eliminate the pull we are going to install new aluminum hub centric rings. My last car was a 98 SC400 and it was really sensitive to the torquing of the lugs on this car I had aftermarket wheels with the aluminum hub rings. As for the lugs I like to have the wheels off the ground and the brakes applied. I install the lugs by hand and then torque them to 50 ft lbs. and then proceed to torque them in a star pattern proceeding to up the torque by 5 ft lbs each round until I get to 76ft lbs. This has always seemed to be the best solution for getting the wheels to feel smooth in the past. I am such a pain at the tire store I have the tech use the road force machine to balance the tires and I always have them spend 5 minutes calibrating the machine before we start. After we get going the machine measures the run out and if it is high we match mount the tire usually 180 the tire on the rim drops this in half. Then we finish out balancing the tires. It's all a pain and I only seem to have to go through this on the 2 Lexus I have owned since the are so sensitive to the wheels that are on them. I am determined to get this figured out! I am also getting really impatient because I have the stoptech bbk ready to install but I don't want to do anything else to the car before I get this figured out.