I recently had to deal with a very similar problem. It turned out to be a
combination of bent wheels and broken belts in the tires. The car always had a
bad shake in the front end despite everything being brand new. I blew a tire
while on the way to British Car Day in P.E.I. I put on my old bias ply spare
and made it to the meet. I then looked around at the tire dealers to try and
find a new tire. Most had never seen a 165R-15, let alone stocked one. There
happened to be a VW meet going on in the same area and they welcomed me with
open arms. Two new Cooper 165R-15 tires for $150 CDN installed!! I bought 2
more when I got home. 3 of my 4 Pirellis had broken belts. I put the 2 worst
rims on the rear and now my little TR runs like silk.
Bob Annand - 1959 TR3A - TS57799L
John Cowan wrote:
> My '60 TR-3A has developed an increasingly annoying shimmy at about 50
> MPH which has now reached the point of feeling unsafe. It's not so
> noticeable when driving more slowly and diminishes again as speed
> approaches 60 MPH. This is happening despite the fact I recently replaced
> the tie rod ends, had the front end aligned and had the front bearings
> relubricated.
> A friend suggested the problem might be bad shocks. This is certainly a
> possibility since the car sat for 28 years until 1995 and I don't remember
> replacing them when I was first driving it. Other symptoms are consistent
> with this hypothesis. The car dives to the outside on sharp turns. And
> when I push on the right front fender, it rebounds up, down and up to a
> stop. The left rebounds up and down to a stop.
> I plan to add a sway bar sometime and would like to choose shocks that
> are higher than average performance, but don't necessarily want to spend
> $115 each for Konis. Any recommendations?
> If I have this work done, I'd like to take it to a suspension shop
> rather than the local LBC mechanics. I'd order the rubber bushings and the
> lock tabs myself. This seems prudent enough, since the work isn't overly
> complicated.
> Any comments or suggestions would be appreciated.
> Thanks.
> John Cowan
>
> Visit - In Their Own Words Website - an on-line non-commercial publishing
> experiment, plus movie reviews, articles and Left/Progressive links at:
> http://home.earthlink.net/~jfcowan
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