Wheel vibration - VERY frustrating
 

My 2006 e500 4matic wagon is driving me nuts! It only has 23,000 miles and suffers from an annoying vibration in the rear wheel(s). Strange because it is much worse when first starting out (4 or 5 miles). Also, it is more pronounced when going 50-55 mph and I take my foot off the accelerator.

I've had the tires balanced on one of those rolling road machines and I just replaced the original Conti tires with Bridgestone Pole Position RE960. Problem still persists.

I'm taking it back to the dealer on Monday. What should they be looking for other than the standard wheel balance and tire wear?

Any help would be MUCH appreciated!!!

Thanks.

You know, I had those exact same bridgestone Pontenza RE960 and they sucked!!!! They vibrated and where harsh. Got rid of them after 2 weeks by going back to discount tire (30 day try out by bridgestone) and got michelin tires. Just get good decent michelin primacy all season tires for better ride. Michelin makes more uniform and vibration free tires. Bridgestone;s are japanese junk.

BTW, road force didn't help with the bridgestone. Get them off the car as fast as u can! U will be pleased with the michelins. Get ur dealer to send them back to bridgestone asap and get michelins. Good luck. There is nothing wrong with the car. Trust me.

I appreciate the advice on the tires, but I really don't think that's the problem. Same problem exists with two different tires...Continental and Bridgestone. The Bridgestone's were installed today with just standard balancing service. The rolling road balancing was done while the Conti's were still on the car.

Sorry to misread ur post. My problem persisted with the contis and the bridgestone. Both. Even the road force balance job. The problem was a slightly bent rim being out of round and got more pronounced vibration with the harder bridgestone. SO, I replaced 2 rims and got michelin tires. Look at ur rims and look for any damage by curb rash or even have the dealer look at the rim on the machine and measure the runout (trueness of the rim) on the hunter road force machine.

What size rims do you have?

18 inch

sounds like your wheels are bent

I'm certainly going to have the wheels checked to see if any are bent, but why would a bent rim vibrate more during the first 4 -5 miles after starting out? That's the part that has me really perplexed.

my S vibrates from 55-65...idk what the heck it is. I noticed it before getting new rims and tires and after it...idk what the heck it could be. im gonna bring it into my indy shop to see what they say. ill let ya know if they have any insight.


4matic

Had that exact issue on my E320. 50-60MPH, Constant vibration, drove my wife and I crazy when we drove it. Steps to fix:

1. Balance was done
2. Alignment, by Mercedes. When the alignment was done by Butler Tire, they did not adjust the "spline" bolts. MB has the tools to do that.
3. New tires, due to the alignment not correct cupping of the rears were really bad. On the inside of the left rear the belt was showing. BTW- I am using Michelin Exalto's A/S. Very long lasting performance all weather tire, over 35K miles out of them.
4. The suspension was looked over to ensure fittings, bushings were all good. The SA told me they need to be replaced every 100K. I had that done at 105K, so I was good.

After this, issue was resolved.

I'm going to have the dealer road force balance and align all four wheels. Had regular balance and alignment done by the tire shop (Mr. Tire) when they installed the new tires, but I realize that they don't have the special equipment or know-how to do it properly on this car. Will also have them thoroughly inspect the suspension. I'm gonna beat this thing!

Anybody out there have any thoughts on why the vibration is worse when first starting out?

Many thanks for the advice so far.

Bob

Most of the time on a COLD tire that vibrates is that the rubber has a Flat spot from sitting and goes away when warm

Several things to look at

Bent rim
out of round tire..even new tires have defects
MB has a few TSBs on this ..have the dealer run the MVI to see if the car needs the updates

Did the Tire shop line up the dot on the side wall of the tire to the valve stem? as most tire shops forget or dont know how

As I said ealier, Bridgestone tire suck in the winter, they flat spot so badly after leaving the car parked for few hours or overnight and vibrate more for the first 5-10 minutes until they get warmed up and become more pliable. Bridgestone Potenza R960RE are ULTRA High performance tires with hard side walls and are meant for sportiness and handling, not ride comfort. I hated these tires and was smart enough to get rid of them. Good luck. Check out your rims since they can also amplify the vibration despite the tire being warmed up after 15-20 minutes of driving. I HAD TO roadforce those damn bridgestone 10 times and was a waste of my money. The contis vibrated prior to getting rid of them since they worn unevenly since I hit a curb causing 1 or 2 rims to be bent a bit and the tires to wear badly over time., I did not get vibration until 10,000 miles after hitting the curb and was still there with the bridgestone. I got new rims, but still vibration a bit. Then thew out the bridgestone and changed over to michelins within 2 weeks, which never needed to be road forced ever. Smooth as butter.

Did the Tire shop line up the dot on the side wall of the tire to the valve stem? as most tire shops forget or dont know how[/QUOTE]

THis is unnecessary and a poor method since some rims have flat spot on them not near the valve stem and majority tires do not have a mark on them to line them up. Just use the Hunter GSP 9700 road force machine to get the road force pounds below 10 lbs for each tire/rim combo. Any road force number above 15 will cause vibration on Mercedes, BMW, Audi, and Lexus. Michelins are tires that rarely ever need to be roadforced on new and used rims since they are more uniform and round than bridgestone, contis, dunlops.,etc.

I told RCRo that brigestone tires are common to be defective and vibrate when new from factory *thats why they are junk. His older contis vibrated since it wore unevenly since contis are know to do that over time.

Baloo

Even though I read many positive reviews (on this forum!) on the Bridgestones before buying, if I did want to switch to Michelins, would the tire shop take them back after they have already been mounted and driven about 100 miles?

Bob

Hey, I know, I was taken back by how many positive reviews but I had a bad batch of tires like u did. It depends on Bridgestone quality control. Buy some good tires and get them placed on by your dealership since they have better equipment to balance the tires than tire places for our luxury cars. Most tire places have terrible balancing machines that are not calibrated and don't have the appropriate road force balancer, and proper adapter to put our wheels on the machine.

Check out tirerack.com.

Check out this webpage and go to the bottom. It says 30 day try out guarantee.
http://www.bridgestonetire.com/tires...ProductID=1112

I put 900 miles on mines before giving it back in 3-4 weeks.

The car is at the dealer today. First report is that my car qualifies for the Transfer Case Replacement (TSB 2007100004). Could a bad transfer case cause the kind of vibration I am experiencing?

very interesting, thanks!

If its not bubble in the tire, then the wheel is bent.

NOTE: Bent wheel CAN still be balanced.

Transfer case could not cause wheel vibration

:bow: :y Yes what you said. cost me about $3000 to find it out,, wish someone would have told me earlier to just keep MICHELINS on the Mercedes. I now have 20,000 on MIchelin's Pilots and they still look and ride like new. None of the other 3 sets I bought and drove 15,000 miles each even came close.

What I did find,,

1) All of the other tire brands I bought except michelins were made in Japan
2) They all had Made in Japan stamped in the sidewall reguardless of brand name


It appears the Michelins are spiral wound seamless belts where the other tires have a belt with seam. This makes a major difference in the tire rolling. Also given all tires that say Made in Japan with different mfg's can't help but wonder how many companies actually make this tire or do they have 1 company make the tire with a different mold and their logo on it.

So If I have a wild guess. Michelins are made in USA and others would be made by one company with different names to save cost. Therefore given the belt design of the tire the Made in Japan tire just doesn't run as well on a MB as the Mercedes. Perhaps this is why the last S500 I looked at in the show room had the Michelin's Pilots same as I use on my E500.

I went with the Bridgestone RE960 A/S vs. the Michelin Pilot HX based on Tire Rack ratings (4.5 vs. 3.5).

I'm sure they are both good tires and each has their following. I certainly appreciate and value all of the advice.

Still waiting to hear the final diagnosis from the dealer on my vibration problem.

Problem solved!
 

Thanks to this forum, the vibration problem has been solved! It turned out to be the transfer case, which has now been replaced. The first I heard of the transfer case problem was on this forum, so I knew what questions to ask the dealer. I know some of you said that the transfer case could not cause wheel vibration, so I'm guessing that the vibration was coming from somewhere other than the wheel.

I also appreciate the advice on the tires (Bridgestone vs. Michelin). I think I'll stick with the Bridgestones, but next time will probably go with a touring tire vs. ultra performance. After all, how much ultra performance do you need on a station wagon!

Thanks again.

Bob

I think i am experiencing the same problem as RCRoane, I hope some one can help! I experience vibration from the rear going only up hill and it sort rumbles the whole car rather than shakes/shimmy. It's more pronounced when making a turn. Can this be the transfer case also? And if this is a TSB, will the dealer do this free of cost or will i have to pay? I sometimes get different opinions, but i was declined at the dealership i bought my car in to do a TSB free of cost.

FYI - i balanced all the wheels and did full alignment and everything was in spec except for one bent rim (doesn't look bent at all - i have rims that are bent worse and aren't as bad to drive on). I replaced the tire/rim with a snow tire/rim which ran smooth the last time i had it on but the problem persists.