More vibration with new Wheels mounted

[GeddyLee]

I finally have been able to put on my TSW Mondello 18" wheels about 2 weeks ago after the snow/winter season cleared out. They came with the plastic hub centric rings and I installed them on the rims. The wheels came shipped premounted and balanced, the rings at that time were not installed. I installed them once I got the rims.

Anyways there seems to be a lot more vibration than with my stock 16" rims. The tires on the TSW's are the Trazano's 7000 245/45/18's. I thought maybe there was an alignment issue perhaps with my car so I took it into NTB here in St. Louis and had them align it. The alignment specs were not terrible. Even after the alignment I could still feel the same vibration.

My question is...........

Are the hubcentric rings needed? Or were they just included incase I needed them? And possibly could the rings be causing the vibration cause they weren't installed when the company mounted and balanced the wheels MINUS the rings?

Any information would be greatly appreciated!!

I am aware with the 18" rims and wider rubber I will probably pick up a bit more vibration/road feel than with my stock 16" wheels, but this seems to be a bit to much. Its not uncontrolled vibration, but more than what I have experienced with other aftermarket rims.

[SyntheticShield]

Is it occurring at a specific speed or within a specific speed range? Or is it more constant?

[GeddyLee]

It seems to only happen once I start to get speed up. Once I say get to 70mph, it seems to even out a bit, but I can feel it in the pedal and the over feel of the car is definitely there.

Like I said above, its not like it is an out of control vibration feeling, but it is way more pronounced than anything I have felt before. I almost half tempted to take them off and remove the rings and see what happens, but I wanted ask here before doing all of that.

[GR8racingfool]

You might be surprised that most hub centric rings fit on the hub all right, but they don't even come in contact with many rims. I had rings on my car, and they were not even being touched by my HP racing wheels. The lug nuts we have are an acorn style, so really, when the wheels are installed, the lug nuts will center the wheel on the hub, but not use the hub as the center point if that makes since.

Your problem to me sounds like a wheel balancing issue.

You might try switching the fronts with the rears and see how that goes.

Mine did the same thing when I first bought them and installed them and stayed like that till the next oil change when they got rotated, and the vibration went away. But doesn't mean its still there, I just don't feel it now in the steering wheel. I'm pretty sure it was my right wheel that was causing the problem for me, that particular wheel took an awful lot of weight to get it balanced. I might have the tire removed, and reinstalled and re balanced before its ready to go back to the front some time this year.

~F~

[GeddyLee]

Thank you Farns! Do you think i should pop out the rings and rotate the tires to see what happens? Or just rotate and see what happens? HOPEFULLY the weather will warm up sometime this SPRING!

But your issue makes sense. I can only hope mine is along those lines as well. I had them sitting in my garage for almost 3 months before I even used them. I sure hope there is no issues, cause I am gonna have a serious ***** with the company from whom I got them from.

[archemedes]

if the wheels were not balanced correctly you can get a vibration, especially if they did a static balance (as in no weights on outer lip) I have had goodyear tires that would never balance, and other brands that had to be spun on the wheel to balance, if you have any wheel with more than about 1.25 ounces of weight total then the job was not done correctly, or you have a bad tire or wheel

[GR8racingfool]

Try both, play with it and see what happens.

I would leave your current rings on and rotate the wheels first, and see if that helps. If no, then pop off the rings and run them with out the rings, if no, then rotate them back leaving the rings off if no, then most likely in my opinion one of your wheels isn't balanced correctly, or all the way.

I had my HP racing wheels originally being fitted with some Hankook's cause they came recommended to me, so why not...well they couldn't get 3 to balance worth a damn, and they said they the machine is telling me my rims are bent. Brand new rims bent huh? So I had them remove those tires and install the Nitto555's that I currently have, and wha-la...balanced first time around no problem.

Some tire brands just suck on bigger rims. After that...Hankook never got my vote as being a "great tire to get".

These are just my suggestions if it were me, and my car.

The 18's I have, run the off bolt pattern that "does not fit our cars" and "you must run hub centric rings or they wont be centered" well...no rings on my car...and i have a nice smooth ride.

Because the style of the lug nuts we have, center the wheel between 5 different suds.

~F~

[Reptile]

Hankooks on two of my cars....no complaints at all.

Now, Continentals on the other hand.....

[FiFdYnUtZ]

TORQUE YOUR LUGS NUTZ!!!!

Some may be loose!!

[GeddyLee]

TORQUE YOUR LUGS NUTZ!!!!

Some may be loose!!

Trust me there were torqued at 110lbs each. So I know they were tight. And then the other day when I did my brakes, i did a little trick where I reinstalled the stalled the wheel, lowered the jack a bit to where the tire rests on the ground, but not supporting the full weight of the vehicle and then tighted a tad bit more and then lowered the call full onto the ground so the wheel was then supporting the full weight of the car and then torqued them down.

I went into work last night, usually my drive speed varies between 65-75 depending on traffic and police of course It seemed a little less, but I think I might this weekend remove the rings from the wheels and see what happens.

Or maybe I am just being overly sensitive

[David99GTP]

Sounds like a balance issue. I agree with Farns and would suspect a balance issue. If a front tire is out of balance you'll really feel it. Try what ~F~ said and swap them around and drive then. The unbalanced tire in the rear will feel a lot different. That should either identify or eliminate this possibility. Either way you slice it, its an easy test. Back home ice build up in the winter would be enough to affect the balance and give very similar symptoms as you described. Threw me for a loop one winter. Problem went away with a car wash everytime. LOL finally figured it out.
As for a loose lug, I agree with you, a loose lug is probably not the issue. That you'd feel a lot more turning the wheel side to side under driving conditions.

[Stonewall]

I had a similar issue. I took them in to be balanced and the guy called me out back and asked me to watch the tire as he slowly turned it on the balance machine. The tire was not round. No broken treads or anything like that, it was simply not round. He said that it happens sometimes with lower grade tires. I had 2 out of the 4 like that, I put the crappy ones on the rear and really didn't notice the shake problem any more. I've thought about throwing the bad ones on the front and spin them up till they start smoking to see if they become round again. LOL

These were Riken Raptor 245/45-18 tires.