Vibration problem, have a question

[davis449]

I took my car in for a vibration problem. As some of you may recall I have posted about having to take my car in to Discount four times for balance issue. Well this issue has been discovered. It was the alignment. According to my dealer, you are supposed to toe a Mercedes alot when you align it and the idiots at Firestone didn't do this when my sister took it in there. They also didn't bolt it, so it did no good. She had it in there twice for God's sake! Anyway, I am having the dealer do it properly and they mentioned that I should have them do a road force balance on it too. Well I had Discount to a thorough balance this morning when I took it in there for the fifth time to get looked at. Should I have the dealer go ahead and do this after they align it, or should I chalk it up to them trying to get more money out of me? I told them not to do it, but I can change my mind if I need to. The reason I told them not to do it is I'm already going to pay them $170 for the alignment and I really don't think a road force balance on top of that is necessary.

[c280nz]

whats a road force balance? never heard that term before?

I also didnt know you are supposed to toe a mercedes in(i presume you mean in) alot also :confused: ,
ive had 3 alignments on my car and it drove fine after these and they made it slight toe but as straight as possible.
but it never vibrated

i thought you can toe in slightly to save tire wear, not to fix vibration ?
Maby im completely wrong?
was the shop not following mercedes specs in there computer/

[benzfan]

Toe-in is normal on just about every car made. Always go by the factory specs, not what the alignment guy says is what he normally uses. I had to stop a shop years ago from setting toe-in on my old Maserati. The factory specs called for toe-out. Why, I have no idea, but it handled beautifully after that, whereas some of its habits were a bit disconcerting prior to that alignment. It had previously been aligned with toe-in.

[davis449]

Well, they didn't "bolt it" either so she said it may not have held in place because of that.

[c5vetteman]

I have the same problem right now! It is frustrating cause i took it to Dicount Tire like 5 times as well and they never balanced it properly cause i would have a lot of vibration at around 60mph+. My mercedes mechanic mentioned Discount only did a static mode and regular balance instead of dynamic mode and fine balance since mercedes are very sensitive. After telling them that, they rebalanced it again but it still had a slight vibration to it so they thought it might be tire related so they are going to get a different set of tires for me at no charge. I had Kumho's and now im getting Nitto's. Hopefully they solve the problem if not im going to take it to the dealer. After reading the post i need to check if maybe alignment is to blame as well. I just recently aligned it after lowering my car and took it almost 3 times to firestone until finally taking it to goodyear. I will have to check on the whole toe in deal. This is really frustrating, hopefully it gets fixed soon.

[davis449]

You live in SA too huh. You should check out strictlyea.com, it's a car club I belong to here for European cars of all types. Really cool crowd. You should come out to the meet this month.

[tpliquid]

road force balanceing shodl be free. u alreayd took ur car in 5 times. they sholdnt charge u for it.. all it does is move a roller down on the tire... it takes like 2 extra seconds to do a force balancing......................
so go bring it back and tell them to do it for free

[davis449]

Originally posted by tpliquid
road force balanceing shodl be free. u alreayd took ur car in 5 times. they sholdnt charge u for it.. all it does is move a roller down on the tire... it takes like 2 extra seconds to do a force balancing......................
so go bring it back and tell them to do it for free

Oh I will, I'm just not going to pay the dealer for it.

[tpliquid]

humm if that fails.. it must be the kuhmo tires..

man we get alot of kuhmo tires in because they wre faulty....we get at least 1 every 2-3 days.

[Dr.Drew]

maybe discount tire is the problem take it to the dealer

[davis449]

Got the alignment done at the dealer and, as predicted, still had a little vibration. Took it over to Discount made them do a road force balance and VIOLA, no more vibration, smooth as a baby's ass! Nothing really wrong with the tires, except for a little abnormal wear due to the alignment being out, but not even near bad enough to have to replace them. It will wear out normal now. They also reasealed my rear diff, under warranty, so that shouldn't be a future problem.