The weight fell off the rear passenger side wheel. I haven't been driving her much, but the weather is good this week so I am driving her today. Am I doing any damage to the tire driving it without the weight?

 

No damage will occur, but you will feel the vibration, mild to severe depending on your speed and the size of the weight lost. Just get her into a tire place when you can.

 

Unfortunately, even after having it force balanced at the dealer, I have always had vibration in the steering wheel. The mechanic told me that his idea of vibration and mine were different. What I got from that was "It's your imagination".

So now, with the weight off it doesn't feel any different than when the weight was on. They didn't tell me anything else was wrong i.e. bearings, etc. so I don't know.....

One thing I do know... I don't feel anything in the steering wheel when I drive my Explorer and I would expect the Jag to feel comparable.

 

I would try one other shop, to get the 'road force balance' re-performed. Even if its the same machine, the techs may be different. What mine told me last time I had mine done (is free with since I purchased the tires with them), is that I have a small dent in my inner wheel, and he could not get the perfect balance. I get only a slight vibration at 70-75 mph. If they find something like that on yours, there is no combination of weights that can fix it. My tire shop charged me $135 or something in that range for repairing the wheel AND refinishing it to original silver glory.

Now, also...before I had my shock changed, I was getting a ton of vibration. I thought it was this wheel, but it turns out since my shock's lower bushing was bad, it was causing the vibration. I do hear the lower bushings often go on our cars. Something to consider if the wheel comes back perfectly round.

 

The missing weight is also going to cause uneven tire wear, which in turn will cause the balance to get worse, which will cause more uneven wear, which will cause the balance to get worse...

But that's only if you ignore it. You should get the tire(s) balanced, but it's not an emergency.

 

I had some vibration in mine when I first bought it. Had it balanced, and still the same problem. I brought it back and they took the tire off and spun it, and you could see what they called a "pothole ding" in the side of the rim. Luckily, the guy there told me about a place, here in Baton Rouge that is one of the only places in the country that can fix those sorts of problems. I brought it there and they fixed the wheel for somewhere around $100 and that solved the problem. You might want to check the rims.

 

Kevin, there are very many places the can repair wheels/rims. I know of at least 20 here in Atlanta.

Ann, see if you can find a shop that can balance the wheels on your car. That's the only way I could get a proper balance on my Rolls.

 

OK Lew, I guess I need to clarify for you. The guy who sent me there, and the guy who owns the shop told me that there are only about 5 or 6 places in the country that have the specialized equipment that he does. If you really need it, I'll give you his phone number, and you can call him up and dispute it with him, not me. Well, here you go. http://fishauto.net/

 

Just letting you know that you were told a .......... incorrect information. Nothing against you for sure.

 

Well, after you speak with him, let me know what you think. Whatever the case, he did a good job for me. Thanks.

 

My first car, at 106k miles had a rebuilt front end, under warranty, new Michelin SP2's and a good balance. A thing of beauty! You didn't know whether you were going 60 or 120. Died at a traffic light 6 months later.

The current car (56k miles)has been a continuing disappointment regarding tire balance. Had it force balanced twice since new tires, a local off-the-car spin balance made it better. A Jaguar Dealer technician swore that there was nothing wrong with the suspension.

Looking forward to putting a new set of tires on the front end, Continental Sport Contact on now. Never again.

A car of the reputed quality should not have these problems.

 

I recently put new tires on the rear since one of the old ones was damaged due to low pressure and sitting too long.

A storm took the power out of the shop while the work was being done, so they could not balance at the time. I've been running without a balance since (no outrageous speeds) and have had NO vibration problems.

20" Detroit Wheels with Falken 452 tires.

 

Just bought new tires and got a pretty bad steering wheel wobble - Kumhos on stock 17" rims. Went in for a road force balance and it helped, but it's still there. Interesting thing is that the wobble comes and goes at different speeds; sometimes it's rock solid at 70, other times it wobbles. Then it wobbles at 60 and then sometimes it doesn't, although it does go away at 90.....that is, if I ever was to drive at 90.....

Planning on crawling all over the front end this weekend and have seen on this well-informed board the complete laundry list of ball joint issues, bushes, all the way up to the universal joints on the back axle and wondered if anyone had experienced the same that would give me a good starting point. Front end doesn't clunk, make untoward noises or suffer from "Random Redirection".

Cheers,
Hamish
2001 MY XK8

 

The variable speed wobble definitely sounds like unbalanced tires... actually, a pair of unbalanced tires. What happens is that the two tires rotate at slightly different speeds due to different air pressure in the tire or going through a curve or something. Every once in a while the two unbalanced points reach a point where they in phase with each other and it causes the steering wheel to shake. Then, as the two points diverge, the shaking get less and less until the two points are 180 degrees out of phase. At that point everything feels nice and smooth. You'll only notice it at higher speeds, and sometimes you're doing 60 when it happens, other times you're doing 70.

 

This is where you need the guy that can spin balance the tires on the car.