Infiniti FX Owners Forum (The Org)

So I rotated my tires and now have vibrations in the steering wheel. The manual says the front tires go to the back, and the back tires go to the opposite front ( I think this is what the manual says). Although my Hankook tires are not directional I think my problem may be related to the tires now spinning in a different direction then they did.

If you look at the right rear tire, when you move it to the front it still spins in the same forward direction.

But once you move the front tire to the opposite side its now spinning backwards.

Its AWD, and I have 20's. Just wondering if any one had any suggestions, or opinions on what your method is ?

Deleted.

It's most likely a balance issue. Have the front two wheels re-balanced, hunter roadforce.

Oh man, now they get to scratch my rims again !

Yeah, generally it is a balance issue when this happens.

I have to say I am really tired of thinking of and hearing the word "balance" regarding the FX. It is far too sensitive to a slight imbalance.

+1

+1 and then some. we always have to have the 45 balanced several times to get it right, and sometimes it involves more than one shop. most of the prob is the idiot tire jockeys that don't know how to work the machine, but REALLY...

Well took off the front and had them balanced. $25.00. Will throw them on tomo and hope for the best !

Me too. But - does anyone know of a 20" performance tire that doesn't have a tricky balance? The issue lies with unskilled people vs a problem with the FX in my opinion. My Civic with 14" steel rims has never needed a balance. LOL. But I still hate driving it.

Considering 20" rims are becoming the standard on new cars, it shouldn't be this hard to get a proper balance.

I have no problems with balancing on the stock 20's but the 22's is another story. gotta go hunter road force especially if you running spacers. (as close to zero as possible).

Imagine how the punks in Tahoe's with 24/26's feel lol.

Well I put them back on. Way better but not completely gone ! Ill deal with the little bit .

As tires age, it *usually* (not always) gets harder to balance. Especially if the wear is uneven.

For $25 you most likely got the regular balance, where if you are still getting a shake, you need a road force balance.

This is the most frustrating thing about this car if you ask me. After owning the car 100K+ miles, I now know not only what shop to go to, but which mechanic can balance my wheels properly to get no shake. It is an art as a one ounce weight placed in slightly the wrong location can give that shimmy.

Have an appointment for a road force balance at BMW tomorrow. Figure if anyone can balance my wheels, it will be them since most BMWs come with large rims. Please cross your fingers it fixes this wheel shimmy, I am starting to really dislike my vehicle!

re-iterate to them that your car is very sensitive to wheel shimmy and you would appreciate it if they could as close to 0 as possible.

Also to road force all four wheels/tires and put the best two on front.

Get a print out of your road force numbers too. You can see how good or bad they are (the tech can only do so much).

JUST had my summer tires re-balanced... the tire and rim package came balanced from TIRE RACK but they did a piss poor job... I noticed the vibration immediately but put it off for a while... had the car at the dealership this weekend to check a bunch of things before the warranty is up... they had the FX up on the hoist and when the tires started spinning, they were shaking EVERYWHERE... up and down AND side to side... so went to TIRES 23 in Mississauga and they did a good balance on them using a ROADFORCE balancer... strange cause TIRE RACK supposedly has one too... and now ALL my vibrations are gone... there was a bit initially probably from the wear on the tires when I drove on them with a bad balance, but at the end of my trip home they were VERY smooth... I got a full print-out of my balance too so it was cool to see it and have it explained to me...

So far I've managed to find 2 tire shops that actually KNOW what they're doing when it comes to balancing... one in OHIO near Cleveland and one in ONTARIO in Mississauga...

Road force balanced and the shimmy still persists. I think I am resigning to the idea that the only way to "fix" the problem is to just buy a new car. Total BS after 8 balances.

Going to have the tie rods and bearings inspected again and if they still checkout as being okay, I will be a new owner of a Yukon Denali or equivalent this winter.

This is CRAZY!!! I know that balances at shops vary... even with the SAME equipment, it's up to the mechanic's skill to do a good balancing job... did you go online to check who's recommended in your area? I would have NEVER found out about TIRES 23 if the name hadn't come up on THIS forum... even though I think DEFER TIRE in Streetsboro does a better job but TIRES 23 is the ONLY shop that's near me... and when I walked in I was a bit worried cause it was a bunch of young Asian guys... but they were VERY careful with my rims and NO SCRATCHES on them when I got them back... and a WAY better balance than what I got from TIRE RACK which REALLY surprised me...

The following shops near me have the Hunter road force machine:

-BMW
-Infiniti (they balanced four times)
-Tire Kingdom (wouldn't trust them to pick up after my dog)
-Goodyear (my dad has used them, never been able to get a good balance)
-Morris' Garage (looks like a junkyard...not exactly a place I feel comfortable driving in with an expensive car!)

I just do not get why if this really is a balance problem, it has not been resolved in 8 balances. And if it was a bent rim, you would think someone would have mentioned it. I NEVER had this kind of trouble on my first FX.

My last road trip already set the bug in me to buy a bigger car so if nothing is found to be wrong with ball joints, tie-rods, or bearings, I'll say adios to my FX a little sooner than I had anticipated. I'll hate to give up the handling of the FX, however. Also not sure if I'll buy another Infiniti...I have had quite a few problems that while they never left me stranded, cost me a fair amount of time and would have certainly been expensive without a warranty.

Totally understandable... it's crazy how a few members have had such terrible problems with tires (most likely) causing vibrations... it could also be that the initial vibrations caused problems elsewhere, which seemed to be the case for some other members... I was kinda worried when my summer tires and rims were vibrating at highway speeds... luckily the last balance seemed to fix it 99.9%... there's still a VERY minor vibration but not noticeable unless I turn off my stereo and concentrate on it...

Sucks that cars like ours that have the large diameter wheels have so many problems with balancing... but I guess that comes with the territory...

Well, had my car out to replace the dash and yet again, the dealer came up with a BS excuse...this time flat spots.

I am taking my car back out there on Monday and they are going to swap rims/tires from another FX45 they have sitting on the lot. If problem goes away, it's likely tires or balance (I'll be shocked if it goes away). If the shimmy still persists, the dealer is going to call out the "higher ups" from Infiniti.

Also, while I was talking to the technician (who I happen to think is an idiot), he mentioned a lot of QX56 owners complain of a wheel shimmy. Great, that is one of the cars I am considering to replace my FX. At this rate, I might end up in an American car without even wanting to buy one.

I balance my tires myself when I put the Yokos on (I scratched one of my wheels MYSELF... oops). There is a slight shimmy but not nearly enough to piss me off. It might piss off some of you guys but not me

As for the possibility of a bent wheel, a regular old tire shop probably wouldn't be able to tell if the wheel was SLIGHTLY bent. And all it takes is a SLIGHT bend for you to feel at higher speeds. My wife's Maxima has a wheel with a slight bend in it. Eventually I'll find the time to bring it to a place by us that unbends wheels. I've had them unbend wheels before for me and they do a great job. They advertise that they can detect slight bends (like what I'm talking about) and, if I bring the car in, they'll throw it on a lift and examine each wheel and fix them on the spot. One of these days I'll go down. If you have a place similar, maybe you'd want to investigate this option? The place by me is called Wheel Collission Center. It's not a chain but if there isn't anything by you, maybe give this place a call and he may have a recommendation?

http://www.wheelcollision.com/

One thing I just noticed is that each of my rims has between 3 and 4 ounces of weights from the most recent road force balance...that's nearly an entire pound of weights just to "balance" all four tires! My mom's FX, which is still perfectly balanced, does not exceed 1.25 ounces on any given rim. I wonder if it really is just crappy tires even though other members have not had problems with the new Toyos or the Hankooks? I'm going to be pissed if the answer is spending $1,000 on higher end tires...figured $600 tires could do the job considering even that is not exactly "cheap." And if it is tires, the question is what the hell do I buy?

It'll be interesting to find out the results of tomorrow's wheel swap.

I seem to have hijacked this thread. Another update...this is really just me venting more than anything.

The dealer swapped tires/rims from another FX45. They were actually Yokohama Paradas...same result, nice steering shimmy at higher speeds. So, that rules out tires and rims. The service manager then took my suggestion of increasing the tension on the steering rack. They did a 1/4 turn adjustment, really no difference to speak of. It might have reduced some of the minute wheel movement from road imperfections but has done nothing to cure the shimmy.

Now I have to wait while the service manager discusses it with "engineers," and the regional rep will not be back in town until early September.

I did drive a 2010 FX...pretty nice, a lot less jarring than the first gen. FX. The around-view monitor is definitely better than I expected, and the 7-speed in the FX is a heck of a lot better than it is in the G. It's also a little surprising how much larger the new FX feels to drive relative to the first gen...the hood is a lot higher and makes it feel more like a truck when looking through the windshield. If I did not want a larger car, I would definitely buy one.

GJBenn85,
I have the same problem. I have a 2007 FX35, and the problem started happening about 4000 miles after I put on my new tires, the same ones you put on (yokohama parada spec-x). Please let me know what you decide to do.
Thanks,
James