Vibration at highway speeds - 2017 XLT

[cberg]

Here's the "quick" summary... I bought my CPO 2017 Explorer XLT with 33K miles on it, and I noticed the vibration almost immediately after my purchase. The vibration is most evident at highway speeds above 55mph. The brakes also warped quickly after the first 300-500 miles (separate issue than the vibration). The first trip to the dealership for maintenance, they ground the rotors to "fix" the pulsating. They said they didn't notice the vibration anymore after fixing the warped rotors. I noticed the vibration again after my drive home from the dealership, and I also noticed there was a still a slight pulsating in the rotors. I immediately called the dealership and scheduled another appointment. During the second appointment they replaced the front rotors with new ones (so far that seemed to fix the brake pulsing), and they address the vibration by replacing with all new tires. They said the tires were so far "out-of-wack" with heavy road-force, and they couldn't be re-balanced. They determined that the tires were likely defective. The tires were new when I bought the vehicle, and I only put roughly 1,300 miles on them. The new tires seemed to fix the vibration, but only temporarily... The next day I took the vehicle on a 200 mile trip, and after the first 50 miles on the highway the vibration came back and remained consistent, and was more noticeable than before. I immediately called the dealership and scheduled a third follow up appointment. I went on a test drive with one of the mechanics, but he said he didn't notice any irregular vibration. I did tell him that it seemed much less noticeable at the moment, unfortunately, but I blamed this on the rough road of the highway. They kept the vehicle for 2 days and said they would run diagnostics and a "vibration sensor" test. They determined that they couldn't duplicate the vibration, so there wasn't anything else they could do at this time. I found out after I picked up my vehicle that they didn't actually perform the "vibration-sensor" test, because it's an expensive test and this test isn't covered by a warranty...

Anyway, the vibration is still there... Although I wouldn't consider it to have the "death wobbles", it's a very annoying vibration that doesn't make my driving experience very enjoyable. At this point I've at a loss of what to do next to try and resolve this, so any suggestions for a possible fix would be greatly appreciated!

 

[94Eddie]

I had a nagging vibration at speeds above 65 mph and normal balancing did not fix the problem. I tried road force balancing them and this solved the issue. The analysis showed one of my tire/rim combos had a balance issue that was way worse than the other three. They managed to zero out all the tires anyway. I think one of my rims is slightly out of spec. If they haven't road force balanced the tires then have them do it if they have the equipment. Otherwise, take it somewhere and have it done. It cost me about $110 and was worth every penny. The good thing about doing this is it will rule out a tire or rim problem.

 

[cberg]

I had a nagging vibration at speeds above 65 mph and normal balancing did not fix the problem. I tried road force balancing them and this solved the issue. The analysis showed one of my tire/rim combos had a balance issue that was way worse than the other three. They managed to zero out all the tires anyway. I think one of my rims is slightly out of spec. If they haven't road force balanced the tires then have them do it if they have the equipment. Otherwise, take it somewhere and have it done. It cost me about $110 and was worth every penny. The good thing about doing this is it will rule out a tire or rim problem.

94Eddie,

Thank you for your response! What's the year of your Explorer that also had this vibration issue? Also, do you have 20" rims?

I do believe the dealership did road force balancing when they replaced the tires, because they mentioned the road force was way-off on the original tires that were replaced. However, now that you mentioned it, I need to double check their maintenance records to verify that they actually made the necessary road force adjustments after replacing the tires. I only recall them mentioning the road force issue, but I don't recall them saying anything about actually correcting this. I would assume a professional Ford mechanic shop would address this, but at this point I'm not very satisfied since they haven't been able to correct the vibration issue.

 

[94Eddie]

94Eddie,

Thank you for your response! What's the year of your Explorer that also had this vibration issue? Also, do you have 20" rims?

I do believe the dealership did road force balancing when they replaced the tires, because they mentioned the road force was way-off on the original tires that were replaced. However, now that you mentioned it, I need to double check their maintenance records to verify that they actually made the necessary road force adjustments after replacing the tires. I only recall them mentioning the road force issue, but I don't recall them saying anything about actually correcting this. I would assume a professional Ford mechanic shop would address this, but at this point I'm not very satisfied since they haven't been able to correct the vibration issue.

My vehicle is a 2010 Mountaineer with 20" OEM rims. I bought it last November and put new tires on it immediately. It had the vibration from the beginning. I have a hard time believing all four of your tires were that far out of spec. The shop that did mine showed me the readings for each tire/rim combo from the balancing procedure. The one tire/rim was 3-4 times more out of spec than the other three. To do road force balancing properly takes time. A readings are taken then based on the results the tire is spun on the rim and reinflated and tested again. Then it might need spun again and possibly a third time if the balance is far off. Also, the person running the machine has to know how to do it properly. It is not something someone can do without training. They should have given you the specs of each tire/rim as to the initial readings and the final readings if they did a road force balance.

From what you have said, I don't think they did a road force balance or if they did it wasn't done properly. If they had then I highly doubt they would have had to replace all four tires. Especially if they were new when you bought the vehicle. Although balancing might not be your problem, doing a road force balance will rule this out as a problem. Part of the procedure to take the readings measures the dimensions and roundness of the rims. If a rim is off this will be determined during the procedure and whether it is too far off to allow a proper balance.

 

[peterk9]

Welcome to the Forum cberg.
Has the alignment been checked?

Peter