Vibration

[velojym]

Check yer fan, too

[diphthong]

I'll leave you with these thoughts.  There is a tire wear pattern for; toe in, toe out, + camber, — camber, over inflation, under inflation, bad shocks (which is a a lot of BS) what the shock posters try to say is shock wear. Is actually, a balance problem.  With as many tie rod ends as there are, and a loose one could (exclusively) cause a tire to wobble.  Then you would expect to see a tire ware pattern for "wobbling tires." 

What is the essence of the short life of a spinning gyro?  Answer, to spin straight.  If they don't spin straight, they soon fall.   I mean, they use to keep speeding rockets upright with these things.  It is my contention, that tires behave no differently then spinning gyros.  Excluding turning the dead gyros in to really ugly sandals, there essence is very similar.  Now, add the weight of the tires and wheel in to the equation, you now have a (super gyro) something very hard to get out of that grove of spinning straight.   Centrifugal force, kinetic energy, the weight of gravity of the vehicle, all strive to keep a tire perpendicular to its axis, the center line running through the spindle.  Regardless if its side support is loose, a perfectly balanced tire will spin straight.   Which, relative to our discussion, all a tie rod end is, is a pivoting support for the spindle.

I'm not saying what you say didn't happen, I'm sure it did.  But this is how.  It probably was a larger tire with a slight -- slightly moderate :-) balanced problem.  And the completely loose tie rod end you talked about (contributed) to the overall instability of the tire's axis.    So theres no misunderstanding here, there would be NO shaking save for that balance problem to get the (vibration) ball rolling. And after changing the tie rod end, the tire gets its axis support back, and BANG! happy customer.  But the vehicle still has that slight annoying little shake...


I once had a shop owner tell me "it's possible to have just one plug wire crossed"   :-)

[diphthong]

The tenacity here is great.  I've not brought this up because it seems contradictory to my arguments that loose front end parts "don't cause vibrations." 

The front end part continually used to refute my assertions is the "tie rod end,"  and the reason for that, in a backwards kind of way makes both our points.

This is why.  I have said, the effect of a loose tie rod end is seen in the toe wear, not in the appearance of a wobbling tire. Actually, this is not the proper way to state this.
Because, there are two different plains a tire can wobble on, up and down is one, the other is left and right perpendicular to the direction the vehicle is traveling.  Except for a bent wheel tires don't wobble in that plain.  This is why loose tie rod ends pattern ware is covered in "toe wear"

Backing up now to everyone's  example of the tie rod end causing vibrations.  Once a tie rod end starts to become loose, the pressure on the tire from the road pushes it to an abnormal toe setting.  As we all know, the effect of this is a grinding away of one side or another of the tire.  This may appear even to the eye, but it isn't. And the unevenness of the toe wear (causes a balance problem,) the looser the tie rod end, the more the tire is eaten away, the greater the possibility of having a bigger balance problem.

Consequently, a mechanic who gets a ticket for a vibration, finds the loose tie rod end, fixes it, sets the toe, and maybe even rotates the tires.  The loose tie rod being the only real problem he finds, causes the entire problem to be associated back in his mind to the loose tie rod end. When actually it only facilitated an environment for the kinetic energy to start bouncing the vehicle.

Loose tie rod ends are notorious for eating tires.  No other front end part can decimate tires faster then tie rod ends, that's why they are set apart from any other front end part in the matter at hand.


I once had a shop owner tell me "it's possible to have just one plug wire crossed"   :-)

[Irish_Alley]

so if the problem was the tire from the get go then why after fixing it then rotating it would the problem not continue on a different side. because the tie rod was the problem once it was fixed no more problems. now what your kind of saying is that the only way a tie rod could cause this problem if it was multiple problems stacked up but only fixing one fixed it all. and i think we all know a tire/wheel even new wont be prefect this is why they put the weights on it so if a tire came out of balance due to a weight falling off or busted belt the problem would still be with the wheel and any shop would balance the wheel first or even second after taking it off. dont get me wrong i understand what your saying about pysicics and all your experience but sometimes you have to think outside the box

[Blazin]

The tie rod I was refering to was on my 78 K 20. I had bought the truck, and noticed this a couple days later. The truck had a slight vibration, wobble what ever you like to call it. It could be felt in the steering wheel at lower speeds. After a couple days of this I checked the entire truck over and made a list of what it needed. Only thing I could find was a ready to fall apart tie rod end that was not that lose when I checked it out for purchase. I don't think the previous owner new what a grease gun was! Only other thing I found was it needed rear brakes, and e brake cables. Other than that it was inspectable. I swapped a tie rod end on on my lunch break in the parking lot. On the ride home the vibration / wobbel was gone. I didn't rotate the tires, I didn't balance them. I didn't even check the alignment. I just counted the turns out, and put the new one back in the same amount. The tires were all only a few months old, the recipt for them, and the rims was in the glove box. The inflation of all four tires was very close to each other, difference of three, or four pounds between all four.
In other words the only thing I replaced was the tie rod, and it cured the problem.

[diphthong]

"so if the problem was the tire from the get go then why after fixing it then rotating it would the problem not continue on a different side"


Well, first, most of the tires sold today should be rotated so that they rotate the same direction.  I always rotated, front to rear, rear to front.  So The problem goes to the rear, same side.  Continuing... in my example I said "and maybe even rotate the tires" I don't write for a living, my complete thought was—and balance them too— like many mechanics I've ran across  over the years, I suffer from dyslexia.  Putting our thoughts to paper is hard enough, even  with strenuous concentration, they can be not complete or reversed, and we never see it.  You all would be very surprised to learn how long it took me to write any post.

Moving on.   Say the tire with the toe-wear wasn't balanced.  There are two factors here I would have you consider.  The tire with a balance problem is now on the rear. balance problems on rear tires are diminished because the drive-train holds back so of the K.G. it's not so free flowing.  And, you've just put the tire to what is effectually ( a straight axle.)  And I don't know about you, but I and many front end guys I know, have let the rear axle sand down that little bit of toe-ware.  I'm sure your aware of what they call "malwear" if your not, it's the uneven pattern that develops on the rear tires, on front wheel drive cars.  If you balance and rotate these to the front, the malwear is sanded back to normal in just few weeks.


"sometimes you have to think outside the box" 

About the tire going to the rear. Your logic may have been skewed by my incomplete thought.  But, the tire balance wasn't my larger point.  Which brings us to the elephant in the room,  and a point I keep bringing up.  Namely, tires and wheels, because of the way round spinning things are governed by physical law, centrifugal force and kinetic energy, they are akin to a spinning gyro, and being so, if they were somehow knocked off their straight plain, they would recenter themselves.  The fact they are hooked to a loose tie rod end is insignificant.  Tires can not wobble rapidly (the definition of a vibration) in the plain the makes the scenario, of a loose tie rod end exclusively causing a vibration tenable. 

There are over 250 million vehicles in this country, that's half a billion tie rod ends. I have asked for the name of the tire ware, or what that pattern would look like, with no response.  Most front end guys can at a glance of any tire wear, pretty much know what numbers are going to pop-up on the alignment machine.  The wear pattern tells the story, it's like a finger print.  Personally, I can see 1/16" toe-wear at 10 feet.  I'm using this example demonstratively, to show, very slight imperfections are left on the tire rubber, which can be interpreted. To suggest, your scenario would not leave a pattern on a tire is dismissive at best.

I have made my views known well, I've said these views are factually based. In return, all I get is anecdotal examples.  In a forum dedicated to the integrity of the business of repairing vehicles.  Those words should be considered something just under blasphemy, I know they were to me.   And after my audible guffaw, I spent the next six months on and off (with a front end shop at my disposal) trying to disprove this.  I found the truth for myself, before the age of the internet, google, you tube, iPads, or whatever...  If I'm wrong, it's just a google away.
   
 



I once had a shop owner tell me "it's possible to have just one plug wire crossed"   :-)

[Irish_Alley]

with today’s tires. i know on my cars they arnt directional so even chevy suggest rotation like this move left rear to left front same for the right then take the right front and move to the left rear and left front to right rear. unless they are directional this is how they should be rotated so they will see all four corners and get the most life out of a tire. now no one said anything about tire ware with tie-rods i mean if i feel a vibration i try to fix it asap cause its usually means something is about to fail. so if you kept driving with a bad tie-rod i would imagine it would show the signs of a bad alignment but i and people who care about their tires or life wouldn’t keep driving with a known problem. most tire ware problems ant noticed till they check their tires thats when they say oh something is wrong.

[diphthong]

Blazin:

Your arguments do skip most of the peripheral crap, getting to the heart of the issue.  In your post you said "low-speed vibration,"  and that for sure would eliminate any tire balance problem.  Which only get worse with speed.

And that is precisely what I thought when playing with all this.  At low speeds the tire doesn't spin fast enough to straighten itself out, so low speed vibrations could be caused from a tie rod.  But, that was not demonstrated by my experiments.


-----


This is a learning forum.

Don't trust just counting the revolutions when replacing a tie rod.  It assumes a few things; The pryer alignment was done with a rigid tie rod, the tie rod end you just installed is exactly the same as you just removed. 

Tip: Most people do this work with the front end unloaded (jacked-up) driving around a bit or give the front bumper a few jumps is helpful.

Counting the revolutions is obviously a good start, but I found it accurate 10% maybe 20% of the time.  You see the results once you get the vehicle on a alignment machine.  Maybe two out of ten done the way, (total-toe) is within specs.

I uploaded a diagram that is a home remedy for setting your total-toe. 

[diphthong]

it appears somehow users insert other users comments from posts, how is the html copied?
Also, is it common, for an image not to send after its attached?

Image did not take...

[Irish_Alley]

top right of the post is a quote button or when your replying to a post look down then at the top right it says insert quote

[Blazin]

I don't rely on counting the threads to align it. As I stated in my post I did this on lunch break, in the parking lot. It was my top concern to get home that night without it falling apart, and causing me to wreck. A few days later I got it close is good with a scribe, and tape messure. Then a few weeks later after the brakes etc. were done I took it, and had it aligned.

We rotate heavy truck tires from side to side all the time. If they go to far with an uneven pattern its very hard to get them to stop. If they stay on the same side of the truck they will keep on wearing that same pattern. Have flipped a steering tire plenty of times on the rim as well when it has uneven wear starting.
As far as alignments on heavy trucks we set the toe in a 1/16" to the front. We use a scribe and tape messure. There are only a couple of shops around that do heavy truck alignments on a rack.

As far as rear axle alignment on heavy trucks the left hand side has adjustable torque rods. Its just a matter of marking the center of the axle tube, and alot of messuring from two identical points on the frame.

[Irish_Alley]

dang blaz you must have a ipeed also

[Blazin]

ipeed?? What??? 

[Irish_Alley]

ipad  cause there was a double post

[Blazin]

Nope, no I pad. just PC here!