New tundra, steering wheel vibrating 65 +

Hello all, new to Toyota, Bought my second one this year. I love my tundra, but I’m having this vibration at 65-75. I’ve already had it to the dealer twice, all they’ve done is balance all 4 tires they told me the fronts were in balance and the rear were out of balance. they said that fixed the vibration but it did not. I rotated the rear tires to the front and I still have the vibration. I am hoping it’s nothing more serious than a balancing issue. I think I’m going to call the service manager and ask them to rebalance all four tires are using the road force balancer, possibly check alignment too. I previously had a vehicle that would vibrate in the steering wheel unless the tires were road force balanced. It wasn’t the tires, I had them replaced with a different brand tire and the vibration went away only when the tires were road force balanced. So I’m just wondering if anyone’s had issues with vibrations around 65. Truck has not even 800 miles on it and it’s bone stock.

 

likely tire balance. Tundras seem pretty sensitive to it. Also sensitive to slight brake warp which cause vibration when braking.

Tire balance is only as good and the tech doing the work. If the dealer cant' get it right it may be work the $80 to take it to a dedicated tire shop. I will bet they will do a better job.

 

Likely tire balancing issue. They can also try dismounting the tire, rotating it to another position and then remounting it and rebalance.

 

It's likely tires are causing this.
Stock road tires or what tread type are yours?
I got new AT yokos put on mine by the used car dealer, because it had OE tires at 55k miles and all were out of round. They still aren't right because idiots don't know how to balance new tires, even after being told specifically what the customer wants done.

New tires often, especially AT and more aggressive ones, have balancing dots on the side wall. These indicate the proper clocking of the tire in relation to the tpms valve stem in the wheel. This is marked on the tire by the tire manufacturer because they already know the balance of each tire they make from quality testing each one.

If you don't clock the tire properly during mounting, before balancing it, the balance machine will say it's balanced, but once on the vehicle it will vibrate. It took my used car dealer shitmax 2 times and they still didn't clock 2 tires exactly right and I still have slight vibration but I was done dealing with those pos, and it's not bad enough for me to spend the $40-100 and wasted time to get them all remounted and balanced now. At first it was as bad as the OE out of round road tires they tried to sell the vehicle to me with.

Lastly, if you have steel wheels, they could be bent but this is unlikely in your situation and trim package. Cast wheels won't bend, they crack, leak, and break.

 

Welcome aboard from The Pacific South West.

 

my feeling is That it’s a balancing issue, it’s just hard to believe the factory screwed them up and then the dealer did as well. It’s a 2020 Limited Trd so it’s for the 18” TRD rims with Michelin ltx a/t2 tires.

 

I agree.

And check your tires for dots, and Michelins website for how they should be clocked in relation to your valve stem, and see how the dealer did.

BTW pro tip, each tire manufacturer has their own dot colors and instructions on where they go in relation to the valve stem. Just because you know one brands system, does not mean you know any others. They like to make things hard on people lol.

You would think it would be done right but for reference.....

Shitmax is the largest volume car dealer in the USA.
So they should know what their doing, and how to do something this simple, especially after being told how to do it by the customer.

2 different locations in 2 different states couldn't properly clock, mount, and balance my 4 new tires.

Toyota is better at quality, that's why we are all here, but tires are usually done by the lowest paid youngest guys in most shops.

 

Odd, I don’t see any dots on the tires. But my highlander With Michelin’s does have red dots.

 

I'm having the same issue. Mines been back 3 times with no success. Someone told me the Bridgestones they put on the trucks were defective. Idk. Good luck.

 

From what I can tell...my local Toyota dealer Doesn’t even have a road force balance machine. So the likeliness that they are gonna Balance out my problem is pretty slim I’d say. I may try a local tire shop.

 

I run into the same problem with my 2014 Tundra, have about 45,000 miles. new tires about 8000 Miles ago have been balanced by Firestone tire place supposedly Toyota balance them here in Fairlawn NJ. Phenomenal vehicle for road trips so quiet and smooth but that vibration is right at the mile per hour you Cruise when on the highways. Are people that ignorant on a tire balancing machine because I remember I was very exact doing that on the motorcycles when I worked for Honda Kawasaki

 

Balance dots should be on both sides of each tire, but may only be on one side, again each brand has their own way of doing this. Also they can be washed off....... Always check this, trust me.
20 years in the auto industry, oil guy, tire man, full mechanic, service writer, service manager, and retail auto parts manager.

It may or may not be the issue, sometimes tires are defective also, had a set of 4 Nitto terragrapplers that where defective. Would not balance out correctly, had over 6 ounces on 1 tire alone, and they were only 33in AT's.

Also could try balance beads instead of traditional weights.

 

Welcome from NY.

I would try a tire shop that does road force balancing.

 

This is my highlander and Tundra tires. HL we bought in February and you can still see the red dot. Tundra was manufactured 6/2020 and there’s nothing on either side. I’m just scratching my head. I think I’m gonna have my local shop look at the ties and road force balance. If they cannot fix the tires/balancing I’ll go back to the dealer.

 

That really sucks. Some one removed the dots, or they got scrubbed off in a wash. It does happen. All tires have the dots these days.

You got very unlucky here my friend.

I would do what you mentioned, find an aftermarket shop and have them Road force balanced. Or skip all the hassle and have balance beads added. Good lifted truck shops know how to handle this.

Other than beads, it's going to be hard to get those tires balanced without the dots as it will be a guessing game of rotating the tire on the wheel, balancing, and then road testing, repeat until correct.

I would be all over the dealer to either get them balanced or replace the tires and correctly install and balance them. That's what I had to do with shitmax, made them replace all 4 OE tires that where out of round at 55k miles.

Good luck and let us know how it goes.

 

It’s odd, that The other truck I almost bought, different dealer but same options and color didn’t have dots either. But I don’t remember it having vibrations on the test drive. I wonder if I could get Michelin to replace them under warranty if I can’t get them to balance after a few tries. Deeming them “unbalanceable”.
Also I think it’s funny that my truck literally rolled off the truck 12 hours or so before I bought it. So maybe it didn’t have the dots on it? But I also noticed that my previous vehicles, either being new or putting new tires on them, they all had the red and yellow dots/marks on the tires as new. It’s odd for some reason the tundras don’t have and indicators .

 

I love the truck, but hate driving it on the freeway. And my work commute is all freeway. And I’m really never gonna hear the end of it if I tell my wife I need to take the truck in AGAIN. She was not thrilled when I wanted to trade my 2 1/2 year old Ram for the tundra, my reasoning was reliability. So far The tundra has been to the dealer more Than the Ram ever was

 

I test drove 3 Tundras before buying mine and two of them had some of the vibration you are referring to. And I bought one anyway

 

Could be alignment too like you said you were going to have checked. I don’t know anything about brand new vehicles being out of alignment but

 

That is weird. Something not right. Maybe due to the virus who knows.

I would just tell them to do it again, or take it to a reputable shop.

 

You traded way up per the averages, rest easy.

The truck is fine, the tires are tires. Not the trucks fault lol. But I know, women don't understand.

 

Seems like they have, or had a tire installation QC issue at the plant. Maybe even defective balancers who knows.

 

I also drove 3 before purchasing the 3rd. The other two didn’t have the vibration from what I can remember. I still bought mine since I had waited weeks for it to come in and I was excited (stupid I know) and I thought it was odd but it couldn’t be more than requiring a simple balancing. I’m going to keep pushing for rebalancing/new tires.

 

The easiest way to be SURE it is the tires and not the truck (I think it is), is to go back to the dealer and have them swap the wheels and tires off a truck that doesn't vibrate onto yours.

If yours stops vibrate, you know its the tires!


I did this many years ago with an '00 tundra that had a bad wheel bearing that the dealer said was a tire problem... I called his bluff. He had 4 techs sitting idle and a dozen new trucks on the lot...

 

My faith in the dealer is declining...I contacted Michelin and asked them what todo. Found out my local Toyota dealer isn’t even a authorized Michelin shop, and lost likely looks like they don’t even have a road force balance machine! They gave me a local tire shop I could go to and they are pretty booked up. Trying not to get frustrated here. My other options are to take it to the next dealer that’s a pretty far dive, or to the America’s tire near them.

 

I had to get three tires replaced before 1000 miles for excessive road force variation. Smooth ride and I run 45 PSI in all the tires. At 30 and 33 it just would not roll. Tires wearing fine too.

 

I did bump up the PSI to 36-39 with no change. I ended up taking it to the dealer this afternoon and of course, nothing. It drove perfectly fine. Frustrating to say the least. After talking with a service advisor and th service manager, we think it is intermittent. The last time it was in the service manager drove it for about 40 miles and couldn’t duplicate it. Hopefully they can in point something tomorrow, or I can do a road test with the service manager to duplicate it.

 

Well the dealer called on Friday and said they were able to duplicate the vibration. After checking the tires again they found that the Rear left and front left tires had excessive balancing and determined they are too out of round. They said that they have to wait till Monday to contact Michelin to see how they’d like to proceed. I asked them if we could push for 4 new tires and they said that 2 of the tires are perfectly fine, so I should just stick with 2 new, less chance of error that way.

 

Still dealing with This issue, the dealer replaced the 2 “bad” tires and the vibration was still there. I needed the truck so I picked it up last Tuesday and dropped it off again Wednesday afternoon. Right after I dropped it off the rep from Hunter was there to check calibration of the machine. Apparently it was off so they adjusted it and rebalanced all 4 tires. They came back 1 1/2 oz off apparently. They kept it for another 12 hours to drive it. I picked it up Thursday and drove it with my advisor and it was gone! So I drove it about 40 miles on the freeway, was smooth as butter. The next day it was back. And a few more times throughout the week. I got pissed and called my service advisor and left a message. After no call back after a few hours I called Toyota to start a case. Case manager called me and got some info and said he’d get some info from the dealer and call me back within 1-2 business days. This is getting ridiculous. And then today, I finally had a chance to inspect the tires that they replaced. Upon further inspection, they put the 2 new tires on the right side. Why the hell would they do that!!

 

Sorry for your frustration and I feel your.pain. I've been dealing with this since I bought my truck. I have appt 4 scheduled next Tuesday to try to resolve this problem. I'm not hopeful though since the SA told me it was probably just bad roads. Between the various rattles and front end shaking this truck has been to the dealer twice as often in 1 year than my previous 2 Tacomas were over the last 16 years. Not feeling the love.