bad, bad, bad...bad vibrations

[restless spirit]

I put 31x10.50's on my 92 xlt on the factory alloys & while at the tire store noticed a hugh leak from front tranny seal, called tranny shop ( 2 blocks away) poured 3 qts fluid in & drove straight there. They replaced bad torgue convertor & front seal & when I picked it up a couple days later found major vibrations above 58 mph. Didn't feel like front end problem, felt more rearward. Next day returned to tire shop for rebalancing where they only did the fronts... no change. Went back in & insisted on rebalancing the rears which they did without any change. Next, went to tranny shop to see if drive shaft was out of balance or something not seated in reassembly. They jacked it up & ran at 60-65 mph & we noted vibration/bouncing of left rear tire...none on right. All else looked normal. Back to tire store where procedure was repeated & they told me the problem is the wheel itself. I drove away wondering if it was the wheel, why didn't it vibrate with the old tires. Stopped at another tire/auto shop where they rebalanced the rears & said they were only off .25 & .5 respectively & showed me that there is no wobble (lateral movement) so there is nothing wrong with the wheels. I next returned to tranny shop & discussed with the owner my dilema. He said for me to go to a Ford dealership & have a diagnostic done & that if the problem was related to the drive train in any way he will pay for the diagnostic. Spent the day at the Ford dealership yesterday where they tested with wheels & without, tried in & out of 4wd, pulled & reinstalled drive shaft in all 4 possible rotations & ended up scratching their heads & resolved that the problem is indeed the tires themselves. They said I can either try to get the tire store to replace them or spend another $100.00 to go to a chevy dealership to have them "load balanced"(the only place in this city that does this). I know its a lengthy story but just need to know if this all sounds reasonable or is there some simple little querky detail about replacing tires or tranny work on explorers that has been missed. The vibration is significant, enough to make my CD player skip, but no noise associated with the vibration. Thanks for any input.

 

[PTBishop]

just out of curiosity, what kind of tires did you put on your explorer? i just did 31x10.5 BF goodrich, got 67 miles and my front tranny seal blew, now i need a new torque converter, front seal, front oil seal, the o-ring, gasket, and front bushing....weird how it happened...mine doesnt have any vibrations at all, but if you did get a bad tire, you should be able to get it warrentied by the tire shop who did it for you...if not, its a matter of bad customer relations.

oh yeah, did the tranny shop install the torque converter right, i was warned about this, when i pulled mine out....i am in the process of getting the tranny fixed, then im putting it back in next week...

 

[restless spirit]

These are house brand tires by either Kelly or Cooper (I don't remember which) & the leak started before I pulled into the tire shop, just didn't notice until it was up on jacks. As far as I know the torque convertor is installed correctly, that's why I had the diagnostic done by Ford...to find the source of the vibration. They noted that when on the lift, without tires & wheels on but with lugnuts on spinning the wheels above 65 mph, there is no vibration.

 

[PTBishop]

like i said, a tech at my shop told me if the torque converter isnt installed properly, it will cause major issues, what these issues are, im not sure, i will ask him tomorrow, he just warned me, to get it in right the first time because i dont want to come back and do this again.

 

[Jason94sport]

Try swapping your tires around. See if the vibrations increase or decrease. Front to back, side to side etc.

 

[restless spirit]

update

Back to tire store today where they changed one tire at a time & test drove after each change & the vibration never changed. So we confirmed that the problem is not the tires. While test driving with the tires I noticed that the explorer is becoming slow to pull out...then while entering the freeway it wouldn't kick into passing gear. So I'm planning to return to the tranny shop in the morning...we'll see what happens.