More on severe lh driveaxle wobble/vibration

This rapid knock sound with vibration (and a sort of whir-whir or scrape-scrape sound without vibration at slow speeds) developed gradually. I detail all done, parts replaced in my first ppost on drive axle wobble. I was
Its not cupped tires causing the vibration, but the lh outer cv joint is wobbling a lot as it turns. I confirmed this visually by velcro'ing a 4k action cam to the lh forward wheel well and driving car. After replacing both the lh cv driveaxle and the lh hub/ bearing assy (both new from O Reilleys') i still have the same wobble/ vibration! What could cause the outer cv joint to wobble. Seems like it would have to be either driveaxle or hub/ bearing. I am replacing the lh strut now, followed by rh strut. But not much expecting that to make the cv joint run true again.

There's you problem. You bought garbage Chinese parts from O'Reilly's. Stick with OEM parts and you will end up spending less in the long run.

An OEM axle wll last at least 200K miles while if you are lucky you might get 30K miles on the Chinese O'Reilly's stuff if it even works right out of the box.

If you didn't make the mistake of turning in your old OEM axles as cores, they can be rebuilt with new non garbage OEM CV joints.

Sure i have a core. What would be a good source for reman lh driveaxle. Still seems odd that it had exactly the same noise and vibration with original. Like original part had same wobble. I have dealt with Rock Auto a lot....like their fast delivery. Just dont like having to ship off the core.

A lot of people like raxles.com. I personally prefer and used GKN axles from IDParts. Anything other than OEM or GKN is likely to cause issues. RAxles uses GKN joints on OEM shafts.

jimigunne said:

Sure i have a core. What would be a good source for reman lh driveaxle. Still seems odd that it had exactly the same noise and vibration with original. Like original part had same wobble. I have dealt with Rock Auto a lot....like their fast delivery. Just dont like having to ship off the core.

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I have read about that same complaint about auto parts axles a few times.

You could buy the inner and outer CV joints from Raxles or ID parts and have a local driveline shop install them on you axle if you don't feel comfortable doing it.

Or find a local driveline shop and just specify GKN CV joints for your axle.

Before you buy any parts, talk to the driveline shop about their policy on providing you own parts. You may find out that you might not save any money by providing your own Joints.

Ok....it was suggested that the chi-com Oreilly' lh driveaxle i bought and installed was defective, so i replaced it again. This time it was an A1 Cardone from Rock Auto (reman). Still had the same exact knock-knock varying wih rpm, at highway speeds, and high vibrations. So i think it had no effect on outer cv joint wobble. I then replaced both front strut assemblies w/spring, and both rear shocks (they were both bad and rear of car seems to riding a little higher now). Then i read the procedure for front wheel bearing replacement in detail in Bentley manual. When i replaced the lh front hub/bearing assy the first time i lowered the car and put weight back on the wheel without doing stage 1 torque to 148 ft.-lbs. It said this damages the bearing. So i also replaced the lh hub/ bearing again. With a new one from Autozone. After all these new parts it still has the very same knock-knock and vibrations unchanged! The second lh driveaxle and hub/ bearing replacements were unnecessary. With new struts and shocks, i can definitely tell the ride is softer! I am going to take a second video of the lh outer cv joint on the bighway.....seems like wobble it seems to have is unchanged.
If it should be obvious if the tires are cupped just with visual inspection, then they are not. I'm 65 with cataracts, but not that blind. Thavts why i took a lot of time to measure inner and outer tread depth on all four wheels. They are fine, except the michelin on lh front on inner side of tread is only 4mm, while outside of tread is still 5mm. But this tire was recently rotated from the rear.
Now of course since i replaced suspension parts i have to get another alignment, since the mechanic shop i took it to for alignment---amazingly----couldnt tell me i had worn-out suspension parts! And neither could Discount tire, after repeated trips there because of vibration problem. What to try after the alignment and the problem is unchanged?

In order to rule out the cv axle you have to put either an OEM axle, an OEM shaft with GKN joints, or a GKN axle on. Cardone and other aftermarket CV axle suppliers make good axles that work well on almost all cars, they generally don't work very well on VW. I have been down this road and had bad vibrations from both Cardone and Tracmotive axles, finally bought GKN axles from IDParts and they are great. I don't know if the axle is your whole problem but in my experience it is probably at least contributing.

I would agree with Kdawg............

Please have a look at this video:

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=1920206328039589&id=100001507225680

I velcro'ed a little action cam onto front of lh wheel well, and drove it. The noise has always seem to come from lh front side. I can clearly hear a knock-knock varying with cdrivetrain/wheel rotation speed.. But i cant rally hear this sound on the tecorded video. And i am seeing a wobble, but Im thinking the only wobble is of the cv joint boot....the "pleats" or folds are not turning at perfect 90 degrees to axis of driveshaft. But does the cv joint itself have a wobble/ imbalance? Im thinking im barking up the wrong tree that its a front driveaxle imbalance causing the noise and vibrations. Its something else.

How many miles are on this car? Have you ever replaced the lower control arm bushings? Have you balanced the tires? Have you replaced the sway bar links? I obviously don't know what this vibration feel like, I once had a loud clunk from bad sway bar links and a gnarly vibration from worn lower control arm bushings. If the control arm bushings are bad enough that could explain the clunk and and the vibrations. Usually it is the front control rear bushing is the first to go. I would wager $20 you are getting at least some of your vibrations from that axle though.

The front control arms on both side didnt seem worn out, at least there wasnt any looseness or play on them, which i guess is what you would see if bushings are worn out. Yea, Ill try replacing those. (The answers to those questions are in earlier posts) thanks!

Is it possible that the grease dried up and lays on one side of the boot ? Seems like the cv design has slop in it — one post said it's even clicking. Is it possible this is a factory design issue of a high torque TDI hammering the cage out of shape or the balls out of round? Would not be the first German vendor being sub-par - after all the 2012+ is made in TN with NEW USA vendors and they could have been having issues... cages or balls not properly hardened... poor metals... get yourself a micrometer and see just how round the balls are — test deflection of cv on the axle and be very critical of slop or play....

On my son's 2008 passat 2.0t (gas) he had the F-R vibration from 60k on and was under warranty at an honest VW dealer. They replaced the outside CV with a non-OEM unit, and the lower control arm with a delco unit (love those aftermarket warranties). The vibration went away - and is still away 50k miles so far.

It's a long axle.

My Audi A8 had control arm bushings fail at 15K miles and they were replaced under the bumper-bumper. I noticed that those factory bushings failed again at 69K doing other work. So I replaced with the cheaper rock-auto $15/arm grey-market units instead of the Italian-lambo rubber ones and they are going strong for 35K miles now. bottom line: tons of torque and stress on audi-vw front control arms due to our non-autobahn roads so they break apart and just dont live so long.

What freaks me out is the made-in-México sticker on the TN produced passats on these parts that seem to fail. This is the same type of cancer that almost killed the merc suvs made in alabama/MS — VW cost accountants can live with 36K mile quality on bumper-to-bumper warrantied parts. there are under $5-cost parts on my A8 that fail-snap about 55K miles and the dealer will get you for $800 for the entire unit plus labor. A local Florida guy makes a Delrin replacement piece-part that is $40 to snap in place of the $5 part — and he's made a small fortune in a side garage turning these parts out. Lesson- if you can ID the source of the VW engineering issue and offer that snap-in replacement—- using minor web marketing— there is $80k-400K waiting for you on the other side of that one item. Get a few of those upgrades and you are quitting your day job. Just advertise here and save us money too....

Join Date: Jul 2014
Location: Corpus Christi tex
TDI(s): 2006 Jetta TDI BRM
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Goodyear auto re-aligned all four wheels after i replaced a number of suspension components (mentioned in earlier posts). I asked them to check tires for any cupping and they said they are not cupped. Discount Tire telling me the vibrations were from cupped tires was BS as I thought! I made a video from within the car this time, to record the "knock-knock" noise. If one listens carefully it can be heard. Its not a metallic knock at all. Its obviously some rotating part that is not rotating true/balanced. Its not a rotor, as the brakes are perfect....no pulsations at all.
Here is the facebook link:
https://m.facebook.com/story.php?sto...00001507225680

jimigunne said:

Sure i have a core. What would be a good source for reman lh driveaxle. Still seems odd that it had exactly the same noise and vibration with original. Like original part had same wobble. I have dealt with Rock Auto a lot....like their fast delivery. Just dont like having to ship off the core.

Click to expand...

I waited until I had some driving experience with the axles I had renewed by http://www.cvaxles.com/automotive.htm , but now that I have, I can recommend them. This company specializes in custom CV joints and axles, but also does a lot of automotive work as well.

After all that expense....probably arounf $1000.00....it turned out to be one of the michelin tires on the front causing ALL the noise and vibration. I bought two new michelins at Dicount Tire, that was the fix! Sheesh!

That’s funny, only because I went through a similar situation with a B3000 vibrates like hell around 50-60 mph. Measured the tires and the seemed in round. Replaced almost all suspension components upper, lower, shocks, end links, and still had the damn shake and shimmy at highway speed.

Finally I bought a set of wrangler tires and all was solved.

Had a weird noise on the front end of the 06 Jetta and it turned out to be a loose control arm bolt (the front one) [emoji43]


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