BMW 316 motorway vibration

jordo76

Hi guys I bought a 316 yesterday 2001 the car runs great while doing short trips to shop etc but I got it on the motorway and as soon as I hit 65mph the car got a serious vibration in it so I hit the clutch to see if the noise went out of it nope stayed there it's that bad that it is hard to figure out where it is comming from front or rear, any ideas I know the info is vague but need help on this,

ongarite

Get your wheel balance checked and check your tyre pressures.

jordo76

ongarite wrote: »

Get your wheel balance checked and check your tyre pressures.

I tryed all that but no joy it's not coming up through the wheel at all it's like the prop shaft is off balance or something like that

biko

Still I'd be inclined to blame the wheels.
Get them re-balanced (make sure they remove the old weights first) then stick the front wheels on the back this time.
I had a similar issue and it turned out to be a slightly kerbed alloy. Sticking it on the back removed the problem.

Slattsy

Buckled alloy.

S28382

The prop coupling/guibo is known for giving bother on the e46 if left as is it can bust the prop shaft I just had my guibo done on my 323. It could also by any number of things so it's best to have a mechanic take a look before you go throwing money at it.

jordo76

thanks for the reply guys just have that funny feeling that it is the driveshaft, im going to lift the back of it up tomorrow and see if i can get it to replecate the noise to try and pinpoint it, ill let you know how i get on

rufio777

jordo76 wrote: »

thanks for the reply guys just have that funny feeling that it is the driveshaft, im going to lift the back of it up tomorrow and see if i can get it to replecate the noise to try and pinpoint it, ill let you know how i get on

do you mean lift the rear of the car and get the wheels up to 65mph?

if so id be very very wary of doing that

DuckSlice

Could be the caliper sticking on or seized. I had this problem with my e46. And the cAlipers are known to seize up. Easy way to check is touch the wheels after a drive and one will be noticeably hotter than the rest. I know it sounds silly that a caliper will cause wheel wobble and vibrations but it does for some reason.

jordo76

Right I might be wrong in all this, guys I had a look under the the car grabbed the prop shaft and notice a lot of play it when trying to rotate it about 5mm in each direction, I'm hoping it's not the drive shaft in the gearbox any advice guys ???? - feeling worried right now

Rowley Birkin QC

+1 on the seized wheel calliper. Had to replace one in my E46 lately after exactly the same symptoms.

Is there an excessive amount of brake dust on one alloy?

DuckSlice

Rowley Birkin QC wrote: »

+1 on the seized wheel calliper. Had to replace one in my E46 lately after exactly the same symptoms.

Is there an excessive amount of brake dust on one alloy?

i had to do mine last year when i had a 325 e46. alloy was very hot to touch after a trip. and a biatch to get the disc off too.

Rowley Birkin QC

etxp wrote: »

i had to do mine last year when i had a 325 e46. alloy was very hot to touch after a trip. and a biatch to get the disc off too.

I just left it in to Courtneys, not a fan of doing work on braking system myself.

jordo76

jordo76 wrote: »

Right I might be wrong in all this, guys I had a look under the the car grabbed the prop shaft and notice a lot of play it when trying to rotate it about 5mm in each direction, I'm hoping it's not the drive shaft in the gearbox any advice guys ???? - feeling worried right now

If it's 5mm on the outer edge it doesn't sound bad at all. Gearbox and final drive would always have some lash. There should be balancing weights on the propshaft. Can you see any evidence that they have fallen out (they are either glued or welded on on most of the vehicles).

jordo76

i had a good look at the final drive and there seems to be a weight at the top of the shaft so dont think thats the issue, i was talking to a m8 of mine today and he suggested it might be the flywheel but he couldn't really say without seeing it, do they give much problems in general?? quoted €630 for flywheel and clutch kit but dont want to go throwing money into without knowing for sure

thanks again guys for all the replys

challengemaster

You keep jumping towards the expensive problems without ruling out the more obvious and cheaper ones first.

Wheels could be buckled. Caliper could be seizing. Both common issues with the e46. Start from the start!

jordo76

after going back to basic and trying all the above i found nothing that would be the cause of the vibration so i went back to my first hunch and stripped the car back to the final drive and was inspecting it closely and found that the giubo and the center support bearing were only recently done, so i made my way back to the diff to see it there was anything noticeable there and found the the shaft was being held on to the diff with only 2 bots and they were hanging on by there last threads

i removed the bolts stuck a bit of thread lock on them, went for a spin on the motorway and what do you know all is sorted

thanks again for all the posts guys

Jordao76

biko

Sound, glad you sorted it.