Damn, vibratins... bad
 

OK, last night I was going over a bridge that I had never gone over... the posted speed limit was 55... and naturally I was going 60...

Well what wasn't posted was that there was huge ass bump and drop after. Lemme just say that my front wheels bounced on the bump then hit hard on the far side of the drop... the back did the same, though not as hard...

Well, my car ran fine afterwards, but then when I got on the highway... the thing started shaking like a banshee at about 58MPH all the way up to 80+ mph...

It doesn't do it at all at 55, but at 58 or so it does... it's really bad and don't know whta It is... I don't think it's a motor mount because i just replaced mine.

I asked my dad tonight and he said it could be that my tires need balancing now... I don't know if that can be caused by a hard hit or not, but I keep wanting to think that it's bushings or suspension problems... like a bushing popped out or somethig and now it's loose.

I don't have a ton of cash, so I don't want to take it to a suspension shop and say "here fix this".

Re: Damn, vibratins... bad
 

You might have banged up a U-joint. Speed sensitive vibrations are a good sign of that.

Also..
Please don't do this again. Near my home there is at least one fatal accident every couple of months because somebody does this, to get the "wheee!" feeling in their stomachs, and runs into a car that us stopped on the other side. There are plenty more that aren't fatal, but seriously fucked up.

Sure sounds like a tire out of balance to me. Look for the weights, i bet there is one missing..

Not to argue with ya, but I was only doing 5 over the speed limit... you can't expect people to drive exactly the speed limit. I wasn't doing anything wrong was I?

I don't mean to argue or piss ya off... I am just asking... please don't take offense...

It doesn't sound like you were doing anything wrong if you ask me. If you damaged your car because of a big bump in the road, I would think you could make the city pay for the repairs. It works here in Ontario anyways, with speedbumps, potholes and such, as long as your car isn't ridiculously low or anything.

And I agree that it's likely your wheels/tires that were messed up.

The damage my car sustained would be like hiting a speed bump at around 45 mph... damn that's wild that a jolt like that can make my tires off balanced... my dad said $2.50 per tire to be balanced.

I oughta do this anyway.

I shudder to think what would happen if I hit a speed bump at 45mph... I don't even like hitting them at 1 mph haha. I say you make those bastards pay!

I agree, make the city pay - after all, you do pay your taxes, don't you?

When you get your tires balance make sure you didn't bend a rim. They should be able to tell on the balancer
Another thought would be the lower trailing links that go from the frame to the axle may be bent .

i agree with direct freak,a speed sensitive vibration,,
look no further then u joints..when things fail on these
cars,,they just fail,,,i have 1st hand knowledge about
the vibration crap,,,even after your rallying on that bridge,,,or something moved,or transfered out of
alighnment>>>>transmission moved >>>.rearend,,
look under your car..

If the bump had been bad enough to affect the u-joints, they would have failed completely the first time he stomped on it after the incident. He would have had a metallic shower at the diff or, worse, his rex would have tried pole-vaulting. It's going to be tire and/or rim related this time around. You may need to replace the tires if you see a bump or bubble developing near the impact point... :cool:

I broke through an a-arm with the ball-end that the steering system spins on. :)

could it be belts in my radials?
 

The guy at the tire shop told me it could be a tire that's gone bad... as in a belt in my radial (not sure about the terminology, just the idea...) has gone bad. All I may need is a new tire... what do you guys think? Is this guy trying to sell me a new tire?

get up under the car and check it out, for yourself.

Re: could it be belts in my radials?
 

If the belt has seperated, there will be a big bulge in the sidewall of the tire.

ok, i rubbed all over my tires, and they seem fine... i am beginning to think that it's the suspension... which I am not looking forward to working on.

Tomorrow AM I am going to jack the car up and grab each rod underneath and make sure none are loose... then I am goin to get my tires balanced and checked out.

If the wheel weights are still in place and you haven't bent a rim, it might be that you knocked your alignment out. The alignment is easy to mess up on these old cars - doesn't take much especially if it's an all stock front end. that would also cause a speed sensitive vibration and wouldn't necessarily pull left or right. If you bent a tie rod or control arm you would probably have problems at any speed. About U-joints, I don't know how you could wreck a joint hitting a bump and a bad joint can usually be heard or felt at any speed over 30 MPH