# strong shake/vibration under acceleration!!!!!



## jordondouglas1.8t (Aug 2, 2008)

I'm at a loss on what this could be. when i'm on the gas or accelerating in anyway there is a pretty violent vibration or you could even describe it as a knock coming from the front driver side of the car. if i let off the gas the car will coast as smooth as ever, but as soon as i try to accelerate it feels like the wheel is going to fly off.


this issue has just started but it has somewhat of a history so i'll start from the beginning.

A few weeks after installed my coilovers about 2 years ago i went on a 3 hour drive to a friends house. the ride there was great but about half way through the ride back i noticed a heavy vibration start out of nowhere. (same thing as described above)

The problem continued until i got home and took it to a shop. Once it was on the lift it was obvious that there was a issue. The driver side front tire was only miles away from blowing. the inside edge was showing threads all the way around.

i got a new tire put on and all the vibration went away. the guy at the shop just said i needed a camber kit to correct the angle of the tire. It seemed to me that there was more than camber causing the problem because the passenger side tire was fine. but i was happy to have the car ride smoothly so i didnt argue with the guy. I never had another issue with the vibration...

two years later, (a few weeks ago) i got new wheels and tires so I inspected the tire wear on the old ones. the tire that was put on at the shop back then showed even wear all the way across. the inside edge wasn't worn anymore than the rest of the tire. So that eliminates camber as the source of the problem.

After my new wheels were put on I lowered the car some more and got an alignment. The camber was in spec and toe i had was corrected. At the time of the alignment I checked all the cv boots and everything looked good.

This past tuesday I was on my way to a car meet (45min away) and about 1/4 of the way there the vibration struck again. I took a fairly hard turn on the highway and the problem went away. I dont know if it was a coincidence or not but it stopped until i got to the meet. However, on the way home it was on and off. If it would start to get really bad i would just stay off the gas for a few seconds and it would temporarily stop the vibration for a few miles.

Since then i have only driven the car to work and back witch is like 2 miles away. Now its to the point where as soon as i pull out of the driveway i can feel it, so its getting worse. It vibrates all the way to and from work whereas it only used to be randomly on and off.

I thought that the extremely worn down tire is what caused the vibration before, but now i have lots of tread and its doing the same thing. Why would changing the tire fix the problem before if something else is obviously wrong?

I just cant think of what could be wrong... the tires are good, alignment is good, cv boots look good, wheels are balanced..... why would the car shake under acceleration if the engine runs beautifully? 

I have a full stage two set up on the junk tip auto, so i thought the tranny might be starting to go but that doesn't make any sense when the car had the same issue 2 years ago and it just now started up again

sorry for the long post :facepalm:

PLEASE HELP!


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## bufu12388 (Jul 24, 2009)

*Had same issue*

I had the same issue last week on my 2001 GTI and i looked under my airfilter and i would recomend you to take a look as well and u will notice like i did that the drivers side transmission mount is snapped and in my case was handing on 1 bolt. luckly i was able to spot it before my **** was being dragged down the block....


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## jordondouglas1.8t (Aug 2, 2008)

lol my god. I will take a look at mine for sure. I'm really hoping that its the motor/tranny mounts and not some axle/cv bullshi*

what mount did you replace it with? I'm going to buy new mounts no matter what and im not sure what I want to go with. I think im going to to the bfi stg 1 all the way around since i already have their dogbone mount


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## jordondouglas1.8t (Aug 2, 2008)

any other opinions? 

I'm hoping its the mounts but that doesn't really explain how it started, stopped for 2 years and then started again....


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## groggory (Apr 21, 2003)

Check mounts...

But I bet your inner cv joint is warped and is gonna blow.

I have a cheap camber kit fs if you want.

What was your camber at the time of your last alignment?

Pps... Raxles are great for very low cars.


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## jordondouglas1.8t (Aug 2, 2008)

thats the weird part. I'm low but im not THAT low. all 4 fenders are exactly 24" from the ground on 18" wheels. The camber is in spec. It was done a few weeks ago.

will it be obvious with it on a lift if the inner cv is warped? like i said.. when i got the alignment done i made a point to check all the boots. I could have been a little more thorough, but everything seemed fine. I will get it on a lift tonight and see what i can find


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## jordondouglas1.8t (Aug 2, 2008)

and im not very familiar with the drive-train type parts. if the cv is bad.. what do i do? lol

new axle and everything? just the boot? new inner cv?

I need some help :laugh:


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## groggory (Apr 21, 2003)

jordondouglas1.8t said:


> and im not very familiar with the drive-train type parts. if the cv is bad.. what do i do? lol
> 
> new axle and everything? just the boot? new inner cv?
> 
> I need some help :laugh:


Picture this...

On the inner portion of the axle there are 3 cylinders sticking out at 120 degree intervals. These fit into a 'cup' with 3 grooves in it. As your wheels move up and down the axle cylinders slide forward and backward in the 3 grooves. As you drop the car the 'resting' spot in the grooves is farther out and so the grooves have far more stress on them. These grooves can get warped over time by the increased stress of always being on the outside.

The raxles are made differently. They don't use a 3 cylinder style config. They use the ball and cup method that porsche uses instead. So you can go low on raxles without stressing the joints.

I think visually inspecting this is near impossible unless they're totally fubar'd. You can try pulling back the inner cv boot and inspecting it for warpage/damage. But I don't know if you'll be able to see.

I had my car on a 2" drop for a long time and I damaged my cv joint. My car would vibrate around 4k rpm pretty heavily. Also, it was harder to push my car while in neutral than it was to push other people's mk4's. Turned out it was binding. When I finally went with my GT2871 setup I blew the sh1t out of that inner cv cup. Replaced with raxles and no more 4k vibration and the car rolls easy now.


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## Downeywu (Apr 27, 2005)

100 bucks says it's your inner cv joint...i blew through my stock one, and about 5 empi axles untill i bought a raxle...

i talked to a guy about tripod style axles on lowered cars...he said theres about the surface of a dime thats making contact when the car sits so low, which is why they break and wear out so quick.


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## jordondouglas1.8t (Aug 2, 2008)

thanks for the info guys

did you only have issues at acceleration? or just at speed?

I just feel like the inner cv would have gone a long time ago, with the issues i had two years ago. I dont see a worn cv just getting better for 2 years.

Im not doubting it. I just want to know if there is some explanation for it


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## groggory (Apr 21, 2003)

jordondouglas1.8t said:


> thanks for the info guys
> 
> did you only have issues at acceleration? or just at speed?
> 
> ...


The inner CV didn't break on mine until much later. I put probably 50k (50,000-100,000) miles on my 2" drop suspension. Then I switched that up for a 1" drop for another 30k miles while on a GT2560 setup (100,000-130,000). Then I went to a GT2871 for 3k miles and blew that inner CV joint to smitherines.

During the 50,000-100,000 stint I had heavy oscillations at 4000 RPM and mild vibration at many other RPM's...both at acceleration and at static speeds. During this whole time my mechanic told me that my car is harder to push for some reason than other mk4's...and I agreed with him. My alignment was spot on. My tires were inflated. We couldn't figure out the reason.

During the GT2871 phase when I replaced my axles the weird vibrations went away and the car became easy to push.

I think dropping a car more than 1.75" should factor a set of raxles or a set of H2 spindles into the budget.


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## Linskill (Oct 6, 2011)

*Had a problem with the exact same symptoms....*

Something similar happened to me a few months ago while I was driving out to the west coast. Heavy vibration under acceleration, none while coasting. When I say vibration I mean to the point where it felt like a wheel was gonna fly off. Turned out that the CV boot on the transmission side had split open, grease everywhere. Had it replaced and the vibration went away. No problems since. Hope it helps.


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## dillmang (Dec 26, 2008)

tie-rods could be a possibilty as well.


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## jordondouglas1.8t (Aug 2, 2008)

i replaced both the mounts today and its fixed 

its still possible that its the cv though. just having the wheels off the ground and moving the motor around could have temporarily relieved some sort of stress that the cv was under. but, it drove like a dream in the few miles i took it today. hopefully it doesn't just come out of nowhere like it did last time. lol this weekend I'm taking out this girl i met the other day. so im sure as soon as I pick this girl up the cv is going to explode on me  haha but lets hope for the best :thumbup:


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## jordondouglas1.8t (Aug 2, 2008)

TTT

just like thought, replacing the motor mounts only temporarily fixed the problem somehow. The vibration started again yesterday :banghead:

I took the wheel off today and could clearly see the cv boot all tore to hell. 

so my question is, what do i buy now? the entire driver side axle? or can i get just a cv and boot?


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## groggory (Apr 21, 2003)

jordondouglas1.8t said:


> TTT
> 
> just like thought, replacing the motor mounts only temporarily fixed the problem somehow. The vibration started again yesterday :banghead:
> 
> ...


New driver side axle. Empi axles aren't too expensive.

New hub nut. New trans flange bolts. Torque everything to spec.

Note, you'll likely need some triple squares to pull the trans hub bolts out. You'll need a huge axle socket to get the hub nut off. You'll likely want a hub screw press to push the axle out of the hub. Hitting it with a hammer doesn't seem very good to me. You can likely borrow one of these from a local napa if you don't have one (you probably don't).


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## jordondouglas1.8t (Aug 2, 2008)

thanks for the quick reply bud.

my friend works in a mega shop so i should be ok as far as tools. Im just worried about the new axle. what normally causes this to happen? obviously being lowed didn't help, but its not like im going to raise that car back up.... so is the new cv going to be shot after 10k miles?


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## Downeywu (Apr 27, 2005)

jordondouglas1.8t said:


> thanks for the quick reply bud.
> 
> my friend works in a mega shop so i should be ok as far as tools. Im just worried about the new axle. what normally causes this to happen? obviously being lowed didn't help, but its not like im going to raise that car back up.... so is the new cv going to be shot after 10k miles?


how low is your car? and depending on your driving style, they can break even quicker....

i had empi axles. my first one lasted just under a year, then in about 1-2 months i went through 4 of them, you can spend the 100 bucks on an empi and take your chances, or just go right for a Raxle and never have another problem.


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## groggory (Apr 21, 2003)

jordondouglas1.8t said:


> thanks for the quick reply bud.
> 
> my friend works in a mega shop so i should be ok as far as tools. Im just worried about the new axle. what normally causes this to happen? obviously being lowed didn't help, but its not like im going to raise that car back up.... so is the new cv going to be shot after 10k miles?


If you are lowered more than 1.5" (just a round number) I'd say you should invest in raxles. They are a totally different style of axle than OEM or OEM equivalent. If you're going raxles, just do both sides at the same time and be done with them.

Plus, they have a lifetime warranty.

If you aren't lowered, then EMPI or OEM is fine.


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## jordondouglas1.8t (Aug 2, 2008)

all 4 fenders are exactly 24" from the ground on 18" wheels. 

where the heck do i even find raxles? ive looked around a bit and cant actually find them for sale anywhere. Their website doesn't have any info on price


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## Downeywu (Apr 27, 2005)

jordondouglas1.8t said:


> all 4 fenders are exactly 24" from the ground on 18" wheels.
> 
> where the heck do i even find raxles? ive looked around a bit and cant actually find them for sale anywhere. Their website doesn't have any info on price


i would get a driver side raxle, you dont need the passenger side... give them a call...1-800-257-8192


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## groggory (Apr 21, 2003)

jordondouglas1.8t said:


> all 4 fenders are exactly 24" from the ground on 18" wheels.
> 
> where the heck do i even find raxles? ive looked around a bit and cant actually find them for sale anywhere. Their website doesn't have any info on price


LOL :laugh::laugh::laugh:

Oh people these days.

They think if there's not a price published on the internet that it's not for sale.

FYI...The internet is run by people. Talk to said people and answers will be found.


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## jordondouglas1.8t (Aug 2, 2008)

lol what do you expect man? thats how i grew up! 

well, since they're closed could you give me a ballpark price for a set?


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## groggory (Apr 21, 2003)

jordondouglas1.8t said:


> lol what do you expect man? thats how i grew up!
> 
> well, since they're closed could you give me a ballpark price for a set?


I paid $798.97 after shipping for left and right raxles for O2J transmission.


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## Downeywu (Apr 27, 2005)

i paid around 380ish for just the driver side, worth every penny! you can go the empi route and possibly be fine, but with 18" wheels your putting even more strain on the inner cv joint.


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## jordondouglas1.8t (Aug 2, 2008)

thanks guys. I appreciate the help

and how do the 18's effect the cv anymore than a small wheel would? or do you just mean that I have to go lower to achieve the same appearance.... putting the axle at even more of an angle than it would be with a 15" wheel at the same ride height.... is that what your saying?


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## Downeywu (Apr 27, 2005)

do the 18" wheels weigh more? more effort for the axles. How much wider are the tires than the stock? wider tires allow you to get more grip, and if your chipped or pushin a lot of boost...you get a lot of torque which will eat the cv joint up. 

"All that power is going through a tripod style cv joint that has about the surface of a dime making contact when the car is lowered". thats what the guy at Raxle told me :thumbup:


i also run 18" wheels they're 8.5" wide up front and 9.5" in the back, also using pretty big adaptors. the wheels are RH cuprad's :thumbup: i was breaking Empi axles on a ko3s turbo with Giac X+ chip


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## groggory (Apr 21, 2003)

jordondouglas1.8t said:


> thanks guys. I appreciate the help
> 
> and how do the 18's effect the cv anymore than a small wheel would? or do you just mean that I have to go lower to achieve the same appearance.... putting the axle at even more of an angle than it would be with a 15" wheel at the same ride height.... is that what your saying?


First, there are two effects at play here...1) The outer diameter of the TIRE. and 2) The distribution of mass across the diameter of the tire/wheel.

My assumption in this analogy is that of case 1.

Think of it like this.

Your engine applies let's say 100 ft*lbs torque on the axle. The axle turns. For a given angular displacement a large wheel will have a larger linear displacement than a small wheel will have. Thus, the amount of work for a given angular displacement is larger. You are only rotating the engine at a given RPM, which can be thought of in terms of time...so for a given time more work is done on a large wheel than on a small wheel...this means the loading of the axle is greater and more rotational stress is put on it.

More stress means stuff's gonna break more.

Then on case 2.

You have more mass on the outer edge of the wheel. So the axle has to rotate more mass, accelerate more mass, and in turn do more work on that more mass. The axle has to soak that up.

Long story short... dropping your car, using larger diameter wheels, using heavier wheels, using heavier brakes, making more power ... all put more stress on the axles, transmission, clutch, etc.


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## p1bump (Sep 22, 2006)

interesting timing, your post here, as I'm going through the similar sounding vibrations on my 04 AWP 1.8Tip wagon. All of this in the name of a quality ride and chasing some slight vibrations that I thought were tire/wheel/suspension related in the past. I'd even replaced the factory Michelin's with cheapo Rikens from Discount/America's tire, which were slightly out of round. Had them balanced over and over again and eventually had them put on Yokohama YK520. Didn't eliminate the problem, but it wasn't bad anyway, just annoying to me cause it wasn't proper to have that vibration at 60-70. So I went about swapping all kinds of stuff to refreshen our old pony in 2011. BTW, my car is stock height and has the O.E. sport suspension.

Early spring and summer parts replaced:
R32 bushings in the control arms
Tokico Illumina's all around w/ new mounts and bearings up front 

It rode nicer, much more taut, the small vibration still present.

In mid september I replaced:
Timing belt kit from blauparts with water pump on a sunday.
New ball joints, inner and outer tie rods on monday night.
Then went for an alignment tuesday am and everything was in spec and fairly even.

Then a NEW and greater vibration began to pop up leaving town Wednsday. On a trip to LA from Oakland, 500 miles each way, the front end vibrated laterally, left to right, severely so at times. My wife, who never notices anything, said "oh $hit, is that bad?" After cornering hard on an on/off ramp or nice road it would sometimes disappear then suddenly reappear. Made no sense.

Early October I replaced:
Axles: DTA brand, they are not remans & surely Chinese. they have thin O.D. shaft w/thicker walls. they transmit a ton of sound but are cheap, $140 with tax for two. 

No improvement or change except the sounds mentioned above.

Late October I replaced:
Front wheel bearings, *** bearing kits from MJM autohaus. 

zero improvement, in fact, this mystery vibration continued the same. I looked my work over, everything seems torqued and installed correctly. Tires suddenly have severe wear at certain points on the inside edges, as if the wheels were severely out of round, some near cords. so, 

The last weeks of October I replaced:
wheels and tires, got a set of Sarasota wheels with brand new and smelly rubber, Continental DWS, assuming that thought I'd solved the problem once and for all as the Yokohamas were worn so irregularly. 

To no avail. 

Last Monday: 
I shimmed the rubber inserts in the dogbone mount because it is spongy soft. 

The vibration seemed to increase a bit more. 

While searching the world over, some guy on some board somewhere mentioned that busted motor mounts frequently resulted from DIY guys doing timing belts, but I couldn't find the posting or any results from searches. I did remove the mount and thought what the hell, maybe it is bad. 

I've ordered one pass side engine mount from Rock Auto, they have Anchor brand mounts, which I've used in the past and they have always worked just fine. BTW, they are a SUPER DEAL there, $41.04 shipped for pass side. I should have orderd the drivers side too, maybe I will with my next paycheck. But, I just started a new job yesterday and should be working instead of spending a half hour writing this. hopefully it helps someone. 

We have 103k on our Mkiv right now. For many, many thousands of miles I was sure it was a wheel or tire out of round. Augh, i will post my results for you when I have them. 

I spent hours and hours detailing the car this weekend, being absolutely sure it doesn't cost me money as I have the stuff already and that I'm sure, for a change, something I'm doing to the car will not make the vibration worse!!!! 

I will report in soon.


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