My 99 Shake really bad at highway speeds...need advice !!

Hey

I have had my 99 Toyota Tacoma for a year now, the truck is in mint shape.

However the whole body shakes badly at highway speeds of 75mph or 120km

I have had it in the Toyota dealers auto shop, they calmed that it was do to

the tires being off balance. that got fixed, and it still shakes


Any ideas ?

 

ball joints and steering rack bushings need to be checked out, as well as wheel bearings. who balanced the tires?? did they roadforce them?? if not.....i would definitely get them roadforce balanced.

welcome to tw.

 

thanks i'll look in to those ...any advice is great for me as im not mechanically inclined at all

 

I recently had the same problem and went to get my tires balanced AGAIN, tryed a differant place and they told me the tires moldings and belts shifted and that they could not get them to balance correctly.the balace machine kept telling them to add weights. anyone else with that issue?

 

thats very possible to happen to a tire................and numerous things can cause it too, such as hitting pot holes a certain way or something. a roadforce balance may help a little in that case, but tires where the belts are broken or whatever, you'll never get even a decent balance out of those tires. out of round tires from the factory are the same way.

 

How old are the tires? On my last set I could hear a warbling vibration coming from the front end at highway speed. I could see that I was missing a tire weight on the driver side so I had it rebalanced. The problem persisted so upon closer inspection I could see that the tires were worn down unevenly on the inside. They were getting tired anyways so I put on new ones and had an alignment done and presto. Vibration gone. Not saying that this is your problem though...

The guy at the tire shop where I had it balanced told me the same thing about potholes wrecking the belts on tires on the inside. When it happens they are done.

 

yep.....once a belt gets too stressed or breaks inside the tire......no help for it.

 

I Thank everyone for the input, I'm gonna load a video soon cause you'd almost have to see it to believe it .....the steering wheel stays perfectly straight, whoever the hole body of the truck will rock from side to side quite violently when i get to 75mph.

 

thats gotta definitely be a front end problem.........maybe a combination of suspension and something else. hope you get it figured out soon.

 

Rotate the tires and see if anything changes.

When was the last time you had an allignment?

Off the wall gut thought here.... How's your steering rack bushings?
Jack the front end off the ground and grab a wheel and move the wheel left/right without turning the steering wheel. How much 'play' is there in the movement? Steering rack bushings are known to go bad in these trucks.
Here's what I'm referring to:
http://www.keystonekrawlers.com/Mods/Toyota/SteerBushing/TacomaSteeringBush.htm

I'm not saying this is your problem, but I can see it causing a bad shimmy/shake at high speeds if the bushings are really worn.

 

Had the truck into the shop last thursday. I told the mechanic about the swaying at highway speeds and he said its swaying because of the uni body suspension.

if anyone else has had the same problem and found a solution id love to know what was done to fix it.

 

your mechanic is a lazy ass, look at the post above you. my 4runner did it at about 65 mph. i got some newish tires, all balanced and 4 wheel alignment and it still does it. im checking the bushings on mine in a few. good luck man

 

savoy, when you find out your problem pm me, i have a 99 prerunner xc, and it is doing the exact same thing you are having. it is about to make me go apeshit. so far i have replaced front/rear shocks, rotated/balanced/alignment, and still no relief.

 

have you checked your ball joints and steering rack bushings? even the sway bar bushings...check them too.

 

i have checked(or at least my mechanic checked the ball joints and tire rods with a freaking 4ft. pry bar) and he said they were fine. i have personally checked steering rack, it wiggles just a tad but nothing major(should i replace), and how do you check the sway bar bushings?, i know they are easy and inexpensive to replace, but my philsophy is, if it's not broke, dont fix it.

 

does the vibration change on acceleration or anything like that?

 

truck has a slight vib. around 45, then around 60-65 is at it worst(the faster you go, the worse it is), and then it is also pretty noticable right when you let off the gas, and it is only for a sec.,

 

well.......if the sway bar bushings are cracked or mushed out...i'd replace them. same way with the steering rack bushings. fortunately for me, my rack was under warranty, so it got replaced by the stealer, but i still bought a set of energy suspension bushings and plan on replacing them soon. i replaced my sway bar bushings with energy suspension bushings cause mine were worn out. here is where i got my sway bar bushings from.............

http://www.energysuspensionparts.com/products.asp?cat=8273

and i got my steering rack bushings from wheelers offroad.

here is what my sway bar bushings looked like...versus the new ones.....



to check the steering rack bushings.....get someone to turn the steering wheel back and forth while you climb under and take a look..........if the rack moves side to side a half inch or more.............the bushings are likely mushed and worn out............and its a good idea to replace them as far as im concerned.

 

that,with the vibration sounds like the center support bearing for the drive shaft may be bad.

 

thanks for the replies guys, i will look into/fix these issues, but for now, i am getting some shuteye, if ya'll think of anything else, hit me up. i am open to all suggestions and once again thanks, Drew from Bama.