Front end vibration?

ganzhimself

Member
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2012 Mazda 3 Skyactiv Hatch
Well, I'm trying to chase down a phantom vibration in the front end. There's a very noticeable pulsation / vibration at low speed. The vibration seems to get less noticeable at highway speed, but the pulsing noise gets faster. I've tried swapping both the stock wheels (195/50/16) and my just repaired 5zigens (205/40/16) from back to the front on the drivers side. The noise and vibration seems to be coming from there. I'm going to do the same tomorrow on the passenger side. I noticed that the car was making some noise, which I thought was because the tires were near the end of their usable life... Any ideas? I'm thinking it could be a bearing... Not sure, as I can't detect any play in the drivers side wheel at all. I have yet to investigate the passenger side, but since the noise seemed to be coming from the drivers side I checked there first. I lost my patience with it and garaged the car for the night. Any ideas or suggestions would be appreciated.
 
I had one of my bearings go out, but there wasnt any play in the wheel at all. Just a noise I could hear between 45-55. The race had worn through, and it was just acting up. But when I tried the "jack up and wiggle" approach, no dice.

I also just had this problem and it was a bad motor mount. I thought it was a CV axle, but it was just my entire drivetrain bucking around. What shape are your mounts in?
 
And... I think I found the culprit... One of the wheels doesn't have any weights on it. Ugh. So simple. Maybe. Will report back later.

Thanks for the ideas though.
 
Yup... One of the other rims is bent. Good God. If I had known that I would have brought it down to Madison to be repaired with the one that was visibly bent. Well... They're up FS, because I'm done dealing with them. FML.
 
And... I think I found the culprit... One of the wheels doesn't have any weights on it. Ugh. So simple. Maybe. Will report back later.

Thanks for the ideas though.

Just because a wheel doesn't have any weights doesn't mean it's unbalanced. If this were the case your vibe would be getting worse at high speeds, rather than better.

It kinda sounds like it may be a wheel bearing. Unless you really know what you're looking for, I would suggest taking it to an alignment shop to get looked at it. Bad bearings can sometimes be very difficult to identify.
 
Your rotor would have to be pretty warped to cause vibration without braking. I've never really heard of this happening.

This has happened to me... 2000 Impala, stock rotors were complete garbage on those cars and the fronts were so warped that it vibrated without braking. The vibrations without braking weren't horrible, but you could tell something wasn't right. When I used the brakes on the interstate, it felt like the whole car was going to shake apart.
 
This has happened to me... 2000 Impala, stock rotors were complete garbage on those cars and the fronts were so warped that it vibrated without braking. The vibrations without braking weren't horrible, but you could tell something wasn't right. When I used the brakes on the interstate, it felt like the whole car was going to shake apart.

That's GM's garbage for you. I meant more on our cars :)
 
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