Intense wheel vibrations from 60-50km, only on braking? thoughts

Before winter ended the car developed mild vibrations in the steering wheel upon braking from 60-50km range. I figured i lost a wheel weight and would address it next season when the tires go back on.

I changed to my all seasons a couple weeks ago and the vibs were gone.

Last week i started noticing the vibrations returning and today driving on the hwy and having to brake quickly several times i noticed the vibs are rather aggressive ONLY while braking exactly between 60-50 km .
I Never feel it accelerating or any other time. I have no idea what part could do that. I dont get how it was gone several weeks now returned???

If rotors.... it would be consistant through the km range braking
If a steering component it would be obvious upon accelerating and braking and steering.
If alignment it wouldnt be specific to a km range in braking it would be both drive and brake.

Thoughts?

Have the brakes checked - good brake parts are a bargain on these cars.
While it's on the lift, check the front and rear wheel bearings and bushings, too.

Well you know that's a tough one. Experienced mechanic might pick it right up, it's not a diesel thing.
I'd start with an inspection of the brake hardware, then check bearings, bushes, then ball joints, tie rods/rack, strut assemblies.

warped rotor but only when hot enough
most if not all rotors and drums generate a small amount of heat even while not breaking and if your wheel is constantly overtoqued, you will warp the rotor.

^^^^^^what he said, been there done that.
Also see if a caliper is hanging up causing that particular rotor to heat up.

i have had issues with good rotors where the sliders were gummed up and not letting the caliper float properly.
you can take them off and grease them up easily to test. use a high temp silicone breaking grease, not axle grease or antisize.

THANKS everybody, good info! I'm thinking the over torqueing (warped rotor) factor may be the culprit.
I never notice the vibs at first come to think of it, its always a few stop signs in (heating up) before I notice it.
I went with the Bentley torque spec when swapping tires and torqueing lugs down, but who knows what the previous owner had done since I got the brakes with the car and haven't changed them yet.

now I'm not trying to start a whole repeat thread, but I've heard and read so many flip flop threads about Zimmerman rotors and TRW pads being good German rotors/pads then another thread calling them rusty cr*p. obviously ill stay away from cheap Chinese stuff.

what do YOU guys posting in this thread use as a rotor/pad combo (I'm not looking to spend more than $175cnd/ $140usd) for the front and ($125 cnd / $90 for the read) making my budget $300cnd/$230 usd per car. I will be changing all brakes on 2 cars shortly. just looking for a combo that has been tried and you guys can verify they work. Thanks!!

Honestly, Zimmerman rotors and TRW pads, but my next pads will be these already bought two sets:
https://www.tunemyeuro.com/clearance-genuine-vw-mk4-front-brake-pads-tdi-2-0l-1j0698151j/
No wear sensor but what a deal. I plan on ripping out the old wear sensor when the time comes, and leave it wrapped up (fooling the ECU into thinking it's all good). We don't need no stinking wear sensors lol
I might get into ceramic down the road, I dunno.

Wow thats a really good deal !
I use a cross border storage facility in buffalo for my us purchases and ill just ship the pads there and pick them up. I actually called the dealer in toronto today and they wanted 140 per F rotor and 98 for a front pad set. What a RIPoff...thanks for sending that link Ill get 2 sets of front pads

STDOUBT said:

Honestly, Zimmerman rotors and TRW pads, but my next pads will be these already bought two sets:
https://www.tunemyeuro.com/clearance-genuine-vw-mk4-front-brake-pads-tdi-2-0l-1j0698151j/
No wear sensor but what a deal. I plan on ripping out the old wear sensor when the time comes, and leave it wrapped up (fooling the ECU into thinking it's all good). We don't need no stinking wear sensors lol
I might get into ceramic down the road, I dunno.

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Why don’t you just use VCDS and turn off the light, this way you won’t have any thing hanging and don’t have to fool anything.
Just a suggestion, I’ve done this to all my cars since that pad that wears out is never the one with the sensor, at least on my cars.

leave the harness plugged in and connect the wires and wrap them up with heat shrink, that way the harness stays clean.
Those pads are decent but not great. if you daily drive like a sane person (grandma style) there fantastic but not if you have to go though a mountain pass every day. and if you want stopping power like you wont believe, go with a better pad. Bindex is amazing, same with hawks HPS. resurface the rotors or replace and go with ATF amber and do a flush. Replace the bleed screws and put a dab of RTV around them and to hold the dust caps on as well. makes a huge difference next time to bleed.

03tdiwagon said:

Last week i started noticing the vibrations returning and today driving on the hwy and having to brake quickly several times i noticed the vibs are rather aggressive ONLY while braking exactly between 60-50 km .
I Never feel it accelerating or any other time. I have no idea what part could do that.

Click to expand...

My 03 has the same issue. Worse since I switched from 15" winters to 17" summers. I inspected the front suspension during the switch over, all seems good except the inner tie rod end on the driver's side has play. I assume that's the issue and have ordered parts.

Simon

I will inspect my tire rods today, I noticed something off today. both rear rims look good as new no heavy brake dust to be seen. the passenger front was normal also, BUT the driver front was Coated in brake dust?? maybe this is the bad rotor. I figured maybe a seized caliper but then it would be pulling to one side more when I coast and let go of the wheel and it only does a little but not enough for a seized caliper.

how can I inspect my calipers when I remove the pads and rotors? is there a method to "refresh" them, obviously if the piston doesn't retract its seized, isn't there seal kits to rebuild them
the calipers are oem and id rather keep them than swap out for a 90$ trw brand or some other sub par brand.

You could try a laser thermometer first, to confirm higher temps on the suspected caliper.

I have a similar issue on my GLK250: more brake dust on driver front, slight vibration during braking when brakes are already warm. Over-torquing lug bolts was not a factor since I did the last brake job myself, but in 95k miles it has eaten 2 sets of front brakes unevenly. The dealer did the previous two, I did the last one.

New/rebuilt caliper will replace the current one when I next do them.

I'd rather find a known good used one, or get a rebuilt unit.

tie rod and ball joints were all tight, I bought 2 remanufactured oem calipers, bought trw pads and Zimmerman rotors, changing today. will update if the issue is resolved

Nice find. Please do, as I may have to do the same soon.

Curious as to the results, not just right after the change but 5-10k miles down the road.

If it cures the problem but it comes back in a few thousand miles then it's a rotor lateral runout problem.

I put new springs and struts on my 03 today. Struts were original and both springs were broken.

This has almost completely resolved the issue. I think the minor vibration that remains must be rotor runout because everything else in the front end is tight.

Simon

P2B said:

I put new springs and struts on my 03 today. Struts were original and both springs were broken.

This has almost completely resolved the issue. I think the minor vibration that remains must be rotor runout because everything else in the front end is tight.

Simon

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I still had significant vibrations when braking lightly at higher speeds (100km/h+), fixed by swapping in a pair of lightly used rotors ! had on hand.

The bad rotors were Zimmermans I installed 7 years and 110,000kms ago. Pads were still 60%. Not sure what caused them to go bad at this point in their life.

Simon

Sorry for late reponse. Was in alaska

It was the driver front zimmerman rotor.
Turns out that the lower of the 2 slide bushings on the driver front caliper had alot or corrosion and in such started making the caliper stick and not slide easily. The lower half of the pads were on a taper which in turn was always biting the rotor.

When i removed it i used a dial indicator on the rotor and it wasn't even close to flat. +- 30 thou.... very bad warp.

I was wrong btw it was driver rear wheel bearing..... the rotor masked the issue for several k km but somehow it came back and I discovered the driver rear wheel bearing was shot, changed it , no problems in 30k km

Nice feedback. Thanks!

Rear bearings can be difficult to diagnose. Nice work.

Cheers,

PH