If you trust the balancing job, here's a couple things to think about...

If a wheel is bent, they may not notice unless they're actually looking for it. The balancer machines have guards around the spinning tire & it's not real easy to watch it spin.

If a tire actually goes out of balance relatively soon, that makes me suspect a belt is moving around in the tire. That's a manufacturing defect...

How did they replace the CV joints? Replacing the entire axle is good. Replacing individual parts on the axle leaves it possible that the mix&match assembly is not balanced properly.

The inner driver is the cup-shaped thing on the inboard end of the axle. It's the part that goes into the trans, & it has grooves for the spider bearings. If those grooves have wear patterns, & the axle is re-assembled in a different orientation, then sometimes it ends up unbalanced.

 

Hi JimBlake

Thanks for your response!

In regards to your suspicion of the tires.......when the current backs were at the front, when I used to pull into the driveway which is slightly up hill and use it to turn around to park on the street, you would see black tread marks left on the sidewalk! The mechanic did mention two suspicions which was either an axle and also that something may be going with one of the old front tires.

One other thing I have learned by calling other shops........I don't believe my CV joints or axles were done! It was just the boots.

I know this because I paid less than the cost of parts to have two full CV boots, joints and drive shafts(axles?).

So it seems what was actually done were only my CV boots. When the problem was discovered with the torn outer CV boots I was told there was no grease. However Lordco & NAPA said if the boots were torn at all the entire boot & joint should have been replaced which we know never happened (it was just the outer boots I'm sure were changed even though I was told it would be the joint too).

So I'm not sure where this leaves us but I suspect this may change everyone's opinion of what might be wrong although it does feel like a tire may be partially at fault. The thing is that this extreme shaking and pulling occurred after the job was done.

Also considering that only my outer boots and not the joints were changed, was that the proper way? Lordco & NAPA said that I will have guaranteed problems by not changing the joint with the boot.

Thanks guys

 

If the boots were torn for awhile, dirt gets in there & grinds up the parts. By replacing only the rubber boot, you take the risk of whether or not any damage was done. If the boot broke open 10 minutes before you saw it (and it wasn't raining), then maybe it's OK.

In order to replace the boots, the inner joint has to be taken apart. If they didn't match it to put it back in the same orientation, it's USUALLY OK. Maybe you weren't so lucky.

Marks on the driveway? Normal when you do that. But it IShard on the tires to do that. Don't do any steering unless the car is moving, so you don't scrub the tires. But... everyone does itwithout destroying tires all over the place either.

 

I have a friend who is a mechanic inspect it and he caught it early and said no damage was done except to the boots so I guess the answer is that the joints did not need to be changed.

I think either the tire is the problem and a belt is going or probably more likely the CV boots were not installed correctly.

 

Hey my '97 rattles too. but it isnt as bad as yours. Mine, as the "mechanic" says, was due to a change in muffler. i hear the rattle in the front, but only at low speeds, neutral, and reverse. sometimes wen im just sitting at the light it does it too. so i know it cant be the muffler, unless theres a loose tube or some thing like tht.

so maybe if you had a new muffler put on the car, tht could be causing your rattle. just a little insight, but it may be way off since most post have not been related to mufflers, and you havent mentioned getting one either. it may be... a far off maybe...