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[BimmerRob08]

Well fella's, lot's of ideas out there. I do like the idea of swopping the front spacer for the rear (all are 12mm) and see if that makes a difference.

It is possible that the front left rotor might be just thousands of an inch warped only because at a very, very slow roll in neutral or no power applied, I do feel a slight rubbing. I checked it out with the wheels off as I mentioned in the OP and if I turn the rotor, there is a slight rubbing area making contact with the brake pad. But it's so light, so minimul that I find it hard to believe this was manifest itself at 83~92 mph with the slight wobble.
APracing dealer said this isn't uncommen even on OEM new brakes.

I don't feel any pumping or feedback in the brake pedal when applying brakes from 0~83 mph. I do feel it slightly at the 83`92mph area but hard to tell if that's the rotor or the wheels/spacers.

My past experiance with warped rotors is I never felt any "out of balance" feeling at any speed. Only felt feedback in the pedal when applying brakes.

So unless this is different, I doubt it's the disc rubbing on the pad causing this issue. What experiances have you all had?

[Sedan_Clan]

It's likely the wheel balance, not the spacers or the brakes. If it were the brakes, you'd feel it at any speed under braking. I'm dealing with the same issue myself. I had my TPMS installed on my BBS LM's about two weeks ago (..and I'm also running spacers front/rear), and ever since then I began experiencing wheel vibration around 80mph (..the vibration dissipates around 90mph). No vibration occurred prior to having the wheels re-balanced after the TPMS install; I've been running spacers ever since my second day of ownership. I've had Discount Tire balance the wheels a second time, but the vibration is still there. I'm taking it in sometime today to have them balance the wheels for the third time. If that doesn't work, I'm going to take it somewhere else. When Big-O tires balanced my wheels after plugging a nail puncture, I experienced no vibration.

F.Y.I. The rotor surface was prepped before re-installing the spacers.

[han405]

I just noticed my wheels will produce very slight vibrations between approx. 84 to 92mph over the past few days. It is more noticeable when having hands rested lightly on the steering wheel.

The car's setup is 100% OEM, with original wheels and tires from when the car was picked up in Germany.

Currently, the car has approx. 5700 miles on it. The rear tires' life are almost gone, but the front ones still has I would say over 60% life left.
Tire pressures were monitored regularly and maintained within BMW recommended pressure range.

I plan on taking my car's front wheels to a road force place to have them rebalanced. Do you guys think this is worth it?
I assume it is... right?

Is there any other road force balance equipment besides Hunter's?

Your help is greatly appreciated.
Sorry for the Thread Jack. If there's any objection from the OP or anyone else, I will start a new thread/topic..

Cheers.

[ss134]

I have the same light vibration at the same speeds on my 100% stock car with 7K on the clock - mine only does it until the tyres are warm......OP do you drive mainly short journeys? Try taking the car out for a long drive, get the tyres warm and see if the vibration is better/gone.

[C2VNY]

I've just fitted my spacers and the annoying vibration has popped it's ugly head up

It was perfect before so it's definitely the spacers in my situation.
I would say it's not terrible but the fact it was perfect before makes it annoying, however it does look alot better

Going to try clean the hub face, spacer and back of the rim and see if it helps but after abit of reading on here I don't think it will;(

Need another set of wheels but I've just bought gts 369 too

The more modification the more hassle and I've still got 8more things coming for the car but I do still love doing it, am I not right in the head

[alpina527]

Originally Posted by Malekreza11

Its not always the wobbling of the spacer or the run-out that tends to be the problem.

Most spacers are not heat treated and are simply machined from a piece of aluminum round stock. Considering the fact that they are mated to the very hot surface of the rotor hub, they get very very hot and they expand unevenly in some cases. I have seen wheel bolts fallen out because of this phenomenon no matter how many times the bolts were replaced and retorqued.

What kind of heat treatment would that be??

[tom @ eas]

Originally Posted by alpina527

What kind of heat treatment would that be??

Assuming aluminum is the material being used, anodizing (type 2 or 3) would be a form of heat treating.

[shendrick]

Here are a couple of possibilities. The out of round wheel is a possibility but a road force balancer will probably be able to identify that for you. I currently have the same problem with a complete stock setup on 18s. My belief and that of the dealer is that it is the new PS2s. Tires can sometimes be a little out of round or the techs simply don't want to spend the time to get the balance perfect. I remember the original tires and weight spacing from the factory involved as little as a 3/16" wide weight in some places. No shop is going to go to that trouble - and its not even clear that their equipment could get them there. If you can get your road force down into the high single digits or low double digits you ought to be able to solve the problem.

[alpina527]

Originally Posted by shendrick

Here are a couple of possibilities. The out of round wheel is a possibility but a road force balancer will probably be able to identify that for you. I currently have the same problem with a complete stock setup on 18s. My belief and that of the dealer is that it is the new PS2s. Tires can sometimes be a little out of round or the techs simply don't want to spend the time to get the balance perfect. I remember the original tires and weight spacing from the factory involved as little as a 3/16" wide weight in some places. No shop is going to go to that trouble - and its not even clear that their equipment could get them there. If you can get your road force down into the high single digits or low double digits you ought to be able to solve the problem.

^^
This

If a wheel is correctly balanced, the tech should be able to prove it by rotating the wheel 180 degrees on the balancing machine and see no difference.

If a tyre is out of true, then balancing won't cure it and spacers will exaggerate the wobble.

Anodising is simply a protective coating that eats into the aluminium by up to .001". It won't make the spacer any stronger or more accurate.

I recently checked a spacer made by one of the big names which showed axial runout of .0014" at the edge of the face. This is enough to give a 19" wheel some shimmy at 90mph.

The maximum runout at the edge of the face should be no more than .0003". Zero if possible.

[han405]

I went to a Hunter Road Force place to test out the two front tires.
The Left is 33lb, the right is 21lb. Since I was told the max limit is 26lb. The left tire is determined as a defective unit and recommended to be replaced by the tire shop.

I've contacted my dealership and scheduled for a warranty tire replacement.
All they asked from me is to bring the road force test result printout. The dealership has a road force test machine too, so they can verify it with ease.

The crappy part is the right tire has 5700 miles on it already, when I get a replacement left tire, the two wheels will have mismatched tire thread depth..

the tires are from continental.

[C2VNY]

I just took the spacer off and there's no vibrations, just cleaned the hub and going to try it again. However just had a thought has anyone tired to balance the wheel with the spacer on the wheel or will this have no difference?

[alpina527]

Originally Posted by C2VNY

I just took the spacer off and there's no vibrations, just cleaned the hub and going to try it again. However just had a thought has anyone tired to balance the wheel with the spacer on the wheel or will this have no difference?

You can balance the whole assembly on the car without a problem.

The main reason why it will give a better result when balanced on the car is that the wheel is more positively mounted on the hub than on a balancing machine.

Have you seen the way some of the fitters just throw the wheel on the spigot and spin up the hand nut?

[C2VNY]

Originally Posted by alpina527

You can balance the whole assembly on the car without a problem.

The main reason why it will give a better result when balanced on the car is that the wheel is more positively mounted on the hub than on a balancing machine.

Have you seen the way some of the fitters just throw the wheel on the spigot and spin up the hand nut?

After the clean the vibrations alittle less but still some, it's just very little though or not quite as annoying as before. Am getting new wheels fitted in a few days so will see after
that.

I've never seen a wheel get balanced on the car and I've been into cars since I could drive so they actually balance the wheel while on the car? How do they do that?? Or what machine do they use?

[BimmerRob08]

Originally Posted by C2VNY

I just took the spacer off and there's no vibrations, just cleaned the hub and going to try it again. However just had a thought has anyone tired to balance the wheel with the spacer on the wheel or will this have no difference?

Good point! I was actually thinking the same thing to be honest. Since in my case, for sure the spacers are causing some slight unbalance wobble of some sort. I'm thinking when I bring my M3 in for it's windshield replacement, the BMW dealer can do a road-force balance. But if it's going to cost a rediculous amount, I might just go with new wheels and stay with 18" tires as I like them. My M3 was super smooth at a steady speed of 120mph+ on the Autobahn and Autostrada's in Europe. Like I posted in my OP, once I installed the spacers due to the APracing BBK, there was the vibration in the wheel.

The vibration frequency is so close together past 90mph that it's not that you can't feel it, it's there for sure. It's that the vibration changes and I can defiinitely feel the vibe in the gear shift, passenger seat head rest, frame. It's not bad, just not smooth like if I'm cruising at 50mph or like it once was.

[STALKER]

I don't think its your brakes, I have the AP kit as well and any time I have a vibration its because of improper balance or spacers.

I bet its just your spacers.

[BimmerRob08]

Originally Posted by STALKER

I don't think its your brakes, I have the AP kit as well and any time I have a vibration its because of improper balance or spacers.

I bet its just your spacers.

Well if it's the spacers (which I do agree), then I have two choices I guess. Try two new spacers or get new wheels. But i'd like you guys to analyze this for a moment.

When I get up to about 80mph and higher, the wobble in the steering wheel is agravated when I brake. Hard or soft, doesn't matter. Under braking loads, I can feel the steering wheel wobble worse and also most definately I feel in the front wheels. Makes braking and cruising anything higher than 70mph suck. I do NOT however feel any pulsating or vibration in the brake pedal. Although i have a very light groun feeling in the right front APracing disc at about the last 1-2mph if I coast to a stop with no braking. I doubt this is the issue as when that groun was not there in the begining when I installed the BBk, the wobble or vibration of the front wheels as stated before has been there since day one.

The car is going in next week for a windshield replacement. I'll try the road force balance there. What do you all think?

[yankee]

2011 M3 Competition Coupe--I too have H&R spacers(second set) that seem to cause front wheel vibration in high 70mph-85mph zone. Spacers off no vibration. Spacers on vibration. Prior to removing the front, I had all 4 tires road force balanced multiple times at various shops. Balancing did not cure issue. Again, spacers on = vibration. No spacers = no vibration. And the fronts were the bolt on style which would seem impervious to balance issues.

I give up on the front spacers.

Wider wheels all around next time--No Spacers