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Back in 1983, I had a persistent vibration at particular speeds in a brand new Firebird. It took countless trips to the dealership before they finally decided to test the drive shaft, and discovered it was ever so slightly bent. And finally (!!), problem solved.
Not saying that's your problem, just saying that sometimes its something really unlikely, because stuff happens.
Yah, weird things can and do happen. In my case the car was totally smooth with snow tires on the OEM duckfeet. Switching to the new summer wheels and tires resulted in the vibrations.
A few years ago my Pathfinder had a lot of steering wheel vibration, both on and off the brakes. It was time for new brakes and I was pleasantly surprised that replacing the pads and rotors eliminated not only the vibrations when on the brakes, but also when just driving down the freeway.
Maybe....Discount Tire was able to get them from 28/29 down to under 20 on all 4. I need to get it on the freeway to really confirm if they are good enough to live with. I have only been able to do a quick highway spin on them since this latest rebalance.
I do know I won't be buying General Tires again in the future. Back to premium brands like Michelin, Pirelli, Bridgestone, for me no matter how highly rated a lower tier tire is.
Glad they are providing road force balance numbers most shops do not, I believe discount tire always does RFB but that process just gives the tech a number it's up to the tech to improve it. Looks like they did that for you now
Back in 1983, I had a persistent vibration at particular speeds in a brand new Firebird. It took countless trips to the dealership before they finally decided to test the drive shaft, and discovered it was ever so slightly bent. And finally (!!), problem solved.
Not saying that's your problem, just saying that sometimes its something really unlikely, because stuff happens.
You're right.
I have a bad DS center bearing. I notice the vibrations at high rpm light on/off throttle. Driveshaft vibrations can feel like unbalanced rear wheels.
I've had all of the transmission TSBs performed for some time now, so I often wonder if the others that are really disappointed with the trans shifting/performance have done the same as I think the 7AT works well for my type of driving.
I don't really want another car payment, so I may just start saving up for an M3 at that point.
Here here
As tempting as it is to upgrade, anything worth moving to is less reliable and/or more expensive to maintain. And being car payment-free for years now, it’s been so long that my lifestyle has adjusted accordingly.
M3 is a pretty huge step, may your brokerage account provide healthy returns…
Home from another road trip. The balance on the General tires is now acceptable. Not perfect, but I can live with it.
I've always had all seasons on the car before, but now that I have UHP summer tires, I understand why so many upgrade their sway bars. With the all seasons the tires would start sliding before there was too much body roll, and this was on a Pirelli P-Zero all seasons. But these summer tires have so much more grip, the body will really start to lean around corners.
I love having Android Auto in the car. Made it feel almost like a new car. Unfortunately Android Auto does not like going in and out of cell reception, as that kept causing it to crash. I found that leaving the phone in airplane mode prevented Android Auto from crashing. I've updated both the Grom Vlite and my phone in hopes that fixes the issue.
Drove some incredible roads. Saw Hells Canyon. Eastern WA and eastern OR are remote, but the scenery and roads are wonderful. I highly recommend visiting.
WA highway 129 Hells Canyon Visitor Center Got bugs?
I didn't have T-tops, but yeah... we were all Michael Knight back then. Feathered hair and Members Only jackets.
The thing about KITT that I remember fondly were the seats. I had the exact same sport seats in my '82 Trans Am... beige cloth, strong side-bolsters IIRC, and a PMD badge in the back rest. Which I believe stood for Pontiac Motor Division.
Third Generation F-body. Remember the "Iron Duke" 4-cyl that made almost as much power (100hp?) as the V-6 and got over 30mpg, which was amazing in those days for a domestic brand.
Our 10 year old G Sedans would be pro street next to cars made in the early 80s.
GM really got their stuff together in the the late 80s, early 90s with the built LT1 350ci motors they were throwing in the higher end Camaros (SS) and Firebirds (Transam). Those are still pretty nice except that the interior screams 80s-90s.
1. Replace a front axle. The front driver side inner axle boot was starting to tare. I also had the front wheel bearing going bad on the same side. Replaced them both at the same time. It was a bit tricky to take the six bolts out holding the axle on. They cracked loose quite easy, but took forever to unthread due to not being able to use a ratchet. The wheel bearing wasn't to hard either. Took about 2-3 hours though.
2. I relocated the coolant overflow in front of the radiator. This was fairly easy with only needing to add a longer hose and make a bracket to hold it up. So far I haven't seen any heating issues using this setup. I am currently monitoring the engine oil temp and the coolant temp using the ecuteck app.
3. I Modified my takeda/afe intakes. These intakes come in 2.75 inch diameter, but neck down to 2.5 at the MAF housing. While the stock diameter is 2.5, you can upgrade to 3 inch intakes which seem to actually make a bit more power+/-. While cleaning my throttle bodies I measured them and they neck down to 2.75 +/- at the butterfly. After taking these observations into thought I decided to chop out the necked down section of the takeda pipes and replace them with 2.75 in pipe. I did this today and this is what it looks like. It was pretty straight forward. I was never the greatest at tig welding aluminum, but I got them stuck together. Tuner said I would have similar results to 3in intakes due to the restriction point being the TB. I can see that the AFRs are quite a bit leaner, so I'm excited to see how it feels after I get it retuned tomorrow. I just need to re apply the ceramic coating now.
While doing this mod I had a couple questions about intakes. Why do companies sell 3 inch intakes and recommend the stock throttle bodies when the throttle bodies will restrict airflow down to 2.75 anyways? Why not sell 2.75? Why does Takeda make 2.75in pipes, but then neck them down therefore not gaining any extra airflow? Maybe a marketing tactic and also making it so the customer doesn't have to get tuned would be my guess. 3inch pipe seems to be more common. I could see using 3 inch pipe and then having room inside of the pipes for kinked or restricted areas due to excessive weld penetration if it were to occur. Just some thoughts I had LOL.
Take a look at the pictures to see the modified pipes vs from takeda/afe.
I will report back with results.
I have always been in agreement about intake tubing size, Josh, which is why I opted for AAM's 2.75" intakes and I had custom velocity stacks made for them. People have dyno's 330whp on stock 2.5" sized stillen gen3's.
Bumping up to 2.75" is plenty big enough to flow as much air as is needed into the TB and manifolds. I'd venture a guess that 3" intakes may hurt low end performance a bit but I have no data to back that up, just airflow velocity theory.
Did you move you MAF sensor housing further up on the pipe? That's not going to mess with any readings being closer to the TB's? Just curious.
05-31-2023, 05:27 PM
