Driveshaft out of Round, opinions?

I posted in 2nd Gen as well so some of you may have seen this already.

Ok. Finally tracked down the source of that vibration problem I've been posting about. It appears my driveshaft is 15/1000 out of round. Shop says they typically recommend replacement if it's 3/1000 or more.

There's a local shop that does driveshaft balancing, lengthening, repair etc but the 4x4 shop doesn't recommend it, said they've had problems with them in the past. So they called their usual driveshaft guys out in Utah to see what's up. Of course this shop is Tom Woods. They told the 4x4 shop that they have tried many times to fix this problem on Tacomas and the only surefire solution is to replace it with a one-piece driveshaft. I've read up on this on here and what I've come to see is that it's usually hit or miss, especially Tom Woods. So their "solution" seems to me like they have a hammer (1 piece driveshaft) and everything looks like a nail to them.

So I have 3 options.

1. Take driveshaft to a place that isn't recommended by the (supposedly) best 4x4 shop in the area.
2. Buy a one-piece driveshaft from Tom Woods.
3. Try and find a used 2-piece from another Tacoma that may or may not have issues.

What do you guys think? Am I missing anything? Opinions for one fix or another? Remember this is mostly a mall crawler, not a lot of off-roading going on so I'm mostly looking for driveability.

 

There are no easy choices when trying to fix drivelines. I have a single piece rear driveshaft (not from Tom Woods) and it's ok. But on your truck, a single piece might raise questions at resale, and a TW shaft delivered to you is probably $500ish. So I'd start by seeing if I could find a shaft off of a low mileage totaled truck. I think it might be the cheapest option.

 

That's what I'm afraid of. There are no clear winners as far as options go but if I pick wrong I lose money. I think I'm going to have the local place measure and fab a one-piece aluminum shaft as sort of an "buy once, cry once" fix. I've had vibration issues with this truck for over a year now with $1000s of dollars in shop fees and parts to go with it.

I'd go with Tom Woods but I had heard some horror stories so I asked the shop to clarify some things. They said they talked to TW and it would be $500 for the shaft and they wouldn't guarantee it to be "jump rope" free above 80mph. Plus I'd be out the $150 installation fee if something went wrong and had to send it back to TW and the other $150 to put it back on.

The uncertainty of it just turned me off the whole deal. I also don't drive over 80 on a regular basis but I'm not about to permanently handicap my truck to save a few bucks

 

If you go to a one piece, talk to the shop about axle shims. It is my understanding that with a one piece driveshaft, with u-joints at each end, the transfer case flange and the diff flange are supposed to be parallel to each other. I got them parallel by using 3 degree shims from toytec. The front of the diff has to drop a bit as compared to where it is with the stock setup.

The other option is to have a double cardan joint put on the front of the shaft, and then the diff is supposed to point straight at the transfer case flange. Good luck.

 

Thanks. I've heard about this but would basically be repeating words and hoping the shop knows what I'm talking about.

I've decided the first chance I get I'm going to take the driveshaft out and ride around in FWD for a bit to make sure it's actually my problem. I'd hate to spend all that money and find out the tire shop didn't road force balance my new wheels and tires correctly the second time I had them do it and that's what has been causing all these problems.