Wheel vibrations when braking.. changed brakes... came back 7k later

Hey guys back again with more reoccurring issues
- 3 months back I had vibrations in my steering wheel while braking ONLY BETWEEN 60-45 KM (ballpark)
- I removed the front and rear brakes and noticed they were decent quality zimmerman rotors with trw pads surprisingly.*
- I changed all 4 corners again with brand new zimmerman rotors and trw pads. As well as 2 new front oem rebuilt calipers .

Starting last week I noticed the vibration (not as severe as before and also only from 50-45 KM not 60-45km like before ) was present again. Sure enough every time I brake between 50-45 my steering wheel vibrates a little
I need help figuring this out . I'm thinking it's a hub because the new brakes may of masked the issue of it being bent or a failing bearing, but now that they have 7k on them the issue may be arriving again . If it was a suspension issue I believe it would've always been present and not masked by new brakes . But I'm open to any suggestions to things i can check*

THANK you for any help in advance

03tdiwagon said:

Hey guys back again with more reoccurring issues

Click to expand...

Check this post.

http://forums.tdiclub.com/showthread.php?p=5520005#post5520005

It could be you cooked the new ones already. The front brakes were undersized for this car. I've seen cars that commute on the 401 that are very hard on brakes and even warp the OEM VW ones in short order.

Try the Brembo's and bed in your existing TRW pads. Check the hubs for rust and runout when the car is apart. Also inspect control arm bushings, they can certainly magnify issues. Lastly if you have crusty alloy rims, cleanup the mating surfaces.

often as not, the pulsing is not due to warped rotors, but contaminated ones.

My car had some vibrations at certain speeds while braking and it turned out to be the control arm bushings.

skyking1 said:

often as not, the pulsing is not due to warped rotors, but contaminated ones.

Click to expand...

by contaminated what do you mean? once I hit the breaks any residue on the rotors will be cleared off? no?

macoombi said:

My car had some vibrations at certain speeds while braking and it turned out to be the control arm bushings.

Click to expand...

I'm thinking this may be one of the main issues, I took the car apart on the weekend and noticed the control arm bushing and the balljoints are looking pretty narly (as in very original and very worn out) I believe the new brakes masked the issue of the bushings/joints because I haven't had a incident where I had to slam on the brakes and "cook" my new rotors , some moderate braking here and there but never a event that I slammed on it.

ill order some new control arms and well see what happens within the next week or 2

Just buy the bushings and replace them. Very inexpensive and easy to do. I always use the TT bushings as an upgrade myself.

Top strut bushing(s) can also magnify small braking vibrations significantly if they are bad

Uberhare is totally spot on. The swept area of the stock brakes is woefully inadequate.

Our family's ALHs got upgraded to at LEAST the 1.8t/vr6 288's up front as a matter of course, some even got the 312's

This cures the problem for the rest of the cars working life, IMHO. The stock 280's just don't cut it.

Cheers

Tdi Kick said:

Uberhare is totally spot on. The swept area of the stock brakes is woefully inadequate.

Our family's ALHs got upgraded to at LEAST the 1.8t/vr6 288's up front as a matter of course, some even got the 312's

This cures the problem for the rest of the cars working life, IMHO. The stock 280's just don't cut it.

Cheers

Click to expand...

how do i go about upgrading to the larger brake system i think i want to do this as the stock brakes kinda suck. i am very disappointed in the trw pads and zimmerman rotors already warping. I do not like the factory caliper design either they seize far to quickly and cause way to many issues

you find 1.8t or vr6 hubs with calipers, swap them in and go... parts places like Das Parts and Next Generation vw parts are good places to look for these sets.. they know what people are looking for and have kits ready to go.

03tdiwagon said:

and zimmerman rotors already warping.

Click to expand...

My last post for you if you ignore this one.

Did you measure rotor runout when you installed the new rotors? If yes, what was it?

No I didn't measure the new rotors because they are new ? Why would i test new ones before install. I only checked the old ones which was .003" so basically nothing. 3 tho isn't bad . I haven't taken the new ones off to check because it came back so quickly. Making me thing it's the control arm bushings

03tdiwagon said:

No I didn't measure the new rotors because they are new ? Why would i test new ones before install. I only checked the old ones which was .003" so basically nothing. 3 tho isn't bad . I haven't taken the new ones off to check because it came back so quickly. Making me thing it's the control arm bushings

Click to expand...

You measure them to know. I had a new rotor that was machined wrong and was chasing my tail until I decided to measure it.

Are the control arm buhsings ripped?

03tdiwagon said:

No I didn't measure the new rotors because they are new ? Why would i test new ones before install. I only checked the old ones which was .003" so basically nothing. 3 tho isn't bad . I haven't taken the new ones off to check because it came back so quickly. Making me thing it's the control arm bushings

Click to expand...

Because it's a 'system'. New rotors can be perfectly true but it's the combination of hub + rotor that you need to measure. Hub true? Free of rust?
You're complaining about judder during braking that goes away with new braking parts. More than once you've fixed your judder with new rotors and pads but your sloppy bushings stayed the same. Why would it get better with new brake parts if it was your bushings?
And why are you taking the rotors off the car to check runout? They need to be on the car, lug nuts installed with washers to clamp that rotor the the hub.
I had your problem, along with others in those links I sent to your other post on this same subject. I got my rotor runout under 0.002" (I think it was 0.0015"). That stopped my problem. Another choice is to get the rotors turned ON the car, thereby giving you 0 lateral runout, but it's very hard to find a shop that does this.

What did you do to adjust the runout. You said you brought it down to .002 how

I'm testing the front passenger side now with it on the hub.

The rear passenger was .002 + runout
The rear driver was .0015-.002+ runout

03tdiwagon said:

What did you do to adjust the runout. You said you brought it down to .002 how

I'm testing the front passenger side now with it on the hub.

The rear passenger was .002 + runout
The rear driver was .0015-.002+ runout

Click to expand...

Judicious cleaning of the mating surface on my hub. Wirebrushing, checking, scraping, checking. Had to remove every spot of rust. Be sure to install and torque the lug bolts. I had to stack a few washers for each lug. Note that your hub may be bent or bad and you'll only fix that by replacing it, OR having the rotors cut while on the car.

Note that once your rotors have the uneven wear from the lateral runout, you'll need to have them re-cut true again.