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Vibration vote.

  • I have a V6 with the A6 and it DOES NOT vibrate.

    Votes: 35 12.6%
  • I have a V6 with the A6 and it DOES vibrate.

    Votes: 68 24.5%
  • I have a V6 with the A6 and it DID vibrate, but is basically fixed.

    Votes: 6 2.2%
  • I have a I4 with the A6 and it DOES NOT vibrate.

    Votes: 47 16.9%
  • I have a I4 with the A6 and it DOES vibrate.

    Votes: 50 18.0%
  • I have a I4 with the A6 and it DID vibrate, but is basically fixed.

    Votes: 6 2.2%
  • I have a I4 with the A4 and it DOES NOT vibrate.

    Votes: 32 11.5%
  • I have a I4 with the A4 and it DOES vibrate.

    Votes: 30 10.8%
  • I have a I4 with the A4 and it DID vibrate, but is basically fixed.

    Votes: 4 1.4%
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Vibration around 50 mph? Updated poll inside.

210K views 385 replies 94 participants last post by  AvivQ 
#1 · (Edited)
As some of us have talked about, this is the new vibration thread.

If any of you want to reference the old thread, it can be found here. http://www.chevymalibuforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1663

A quick overview without rehashing the old one is this:

Some owners can feel a very slight, to very noticeable vibration around 40-60 mph. Usually comes from the front of the car and can be felt all over usually. Some days it might be worse then others, and we are not talking about a tire issue.

There are reflashes that can be done at the dealer that may or may not help, some have had the tires replaced, some have had nothing work at all.

So lets try to get a new, more updated thread going to help members who just haven't read though the huge old one and don't know any of the new information.

Please vote, and post!
 
#350 · (Edited)
well....i have a 2012...changed front tires balanced, aligned it ...
60-70....bad vibration...real bad had 47k on it when i first called the dealership..they blew me off..said if i wanna come in and pay around 100 bucks an hour..they would look into it for me..

so ive been dealing with it.....i've always been a ford only guy..bought this malibu now im thinking i made a mistake
 
#351 ·
After taking mine back to the dealership they found a problem with the motor mount alignment.? Its seems to have lessen the vibration some but still the occasional 0-20 mph vibration. I'm going to install a new set of tires and see if the problem diminishes totally. Doesn't sound to hopeful from previous replies to this thread.
 
#352 ·
I guess you can add me to the list. I started noticing the vibration around Jan of this year. It would only happen at freeway speeds 55+ mph. At one point my steering wheel was just wobbling all over the place (thankfully it seem that was a fluke and hasn't happened since then....yet). Now...especially when I'm accelerating, my right front tire feels like it's going to wobble off.

At first I just thought all was needed was new tires. Well this past weekend, I bought 4 brand new tires and got them balanced and aligned and I'm still getting the vibration, so it leads me to believe it's more than a tire issue.

I have an '08 LT 3.6 V6, 18 inch rim tires.
 
#353 ·
I had pretty bad vibration just like mentioned in this thread above 50 MPH, and it was exacerbated while braking at those speeds. I replaced the two front rotors and brake pads, and it's buttery smooth now at all speeds.

If your vibration issue is present while cruising at higher speeds, and way way worse while braking, it's most likely due to warped rotors. They get warped from unequal torque on the rotor screws, which causes the brake pads to wear the rotor unequally. Tell your tire guy to use proper torque settings when he's using his air gun to screw the wheel nuts back on.

YMMV, but it definitely fixed it for me!
 
#354 ·
I also noticed that my trailing arms in the rear of the car were really bad, along with warped rotors. The rotors were due to cheap rotors though not my torque specs since i use torque sticks on mine. ;)
 
#355 · (Edited by Moderator)
I am writing about my 2009 Chevy Malibu and let me just start by saying I wish I had never bought it and continued to drive my 2001 cavalier because it was bulletproof. I noticed a clicking sound coming from the right front tire after I bought the car a little over a year ago. I had it back to the dealership but was unable to recreate the issue because everytime I took it back it rained. Frustrated.. I did not return to the dealership after being treated like an uneducated moron. I have replaced both front wheel bearing assemblies, both front rotors and pads, both sway bar links, both stabalizer bar bushings, both tie rod ends and both cv shafts and all 4 tires and had a 4 wheel alignment. Needless to say I am SICK of spending money on this heap of CMF Edit: Language. I am still hearing the clicking noise coming from both front wheel areas that is consistent with speed and if I don't touch the wheel the car drifts right and from 30mph+ I have a very audible noise that sounds like a bad wheel bearing but is not as I have tried 2 different sets of bearings and the noise is still there along with vibration in the steering wheel.
 
#357 ·
Gripe all you want, that's part of what this forum is for. Did you buy yours new or used? How long ago? Is yours the 4-cylinder or V6? (The I4 has EPS and the V6 has hydraulic power steering.) How long did you drive it until the clicking started? What changed just before the clicking started, such as any service work that was done or any potholes that may have been encountered?

It sounds like you've replaced every piece of the front that rotates when in motion except the accessory drive belt and the transmission.

There is also an evap purge valve under the hood, toward the passenger side, near the firewall. It clicks, and if it is sitting near or touching the wrong stuff it can amplify the noise it usually makes and drive ya crazy.

If you have any mechanic friends with a set of Chassis Ears, buy them some beer or other consumable, then have them listen all around for the sound as you drive and recreate it.

Have you had the 3-5-R Wave Plate replaced at any time, either by you or by a possible former owner?

BTW, I edited your comments to remove the language we'd rather not see here. You'll find this an extremely helpful site full of owners who are as enthusiastic about their cars as much as owners of any other brand. There are some known issues and some idiotic "designs" incorporated into these little cars, but we still find them to be, overall, a decent little car. Help us out by contributing your insights.
 
#358 ·
"...every time I took it back it rained..." Hmmm, does it not do the clicking sound when it rains? I feel for ya, but you seem to have given up with the dealer a little quickly..You also seem to have spent a lot of money; I hope high mileage led you to do so, as opposed to throwing parts at a problem. Many of us don't do that many repairs and parts replacements even with 150k+ on our Malibus. I sure hope you get it figured out.

BTW, I solved the problem with vibration on my '09 by trading it for a 2012. Even with the intermittent vibration that I had, I like the cars enough to get another one. Again, good luck.
 
#359 ·
I have to admit, according to the above poll, there are more people with the vibration problem than not. Seems the GM rep that responds every now to these messages would pass this on; and that GM would acknowledge it and try to do something. Of course, they're pretty busy right now with all the other recalls. But, overall, my wife and I love our 2012.
 
#360 ·
I bought the car used with about 60k on it and it clicked when i bought it but as i said I was unable to replicate the noise to the dealership. They claimed it was the rotors pulsating from sitting so they turned them. It didn't make a difference. I have the 4 cylinder. And I didn't give up on the dealership too quickly. I recognize dealerships for the lying and misleading people that they are. I deal with them through my work and have caught them putting autozone calipers on our f-550s and claiming that they are genuine ford parts (they didn't even bother to change the part numbers on the service orders). Now I obviously didn't buy my car from this dealership but I have yet to find one with in 50 mi of me that is not a rip off. That's just one example of the kind of things people try to pull on their customers at dealerships around me. And yeah I may have started throwing parts at it near the end but it was only because there was only a few rotating parts left that I hadn't replaced and I wanted the god forsaken noise to stop. But I've worked on cars since I was very young and know what certain things sound like when they fail.. Ex: The clicking is a tell tale sign of a cv shaft on its way out on a FWD car. And the Vibration sounds exactly like a bad wheel bearing. The sway bar bushings and sway bar links were for a problem unrelated to this (light knocking driving slowly in an off camber parking lot or road). All I can say is that from my experience and what I have heard from others is that this car has more front end noise than any car they've ever put off the line. And I'm not saying that other cars don't require service but cmon. Anyways.. Friday I decided to drive without wheel covers and see if it made a difference - no clicking. I jacked up the front end of the car and put a lateral run out gage on both of the front rims. both rims had spots that slowly eeked up over .050 inches that weren't visible to the eye. Basically the dealer sold me a car with bent rims - and I'll never go back to Progressive Chevrolet. As soon as the sale was over it took my more than 5 emails and phone calls to try to get a hold of someone. And even then they were still beating around the bush. I didn't get an answer until I literally drove there on the only night that they were open late in the evening and walked right up to the sales manager that sold me the car and confronted him about it. And even then he gave me some bs about 'I didn't receive any emails' when I replied right to an email that he had sent me. A lot of griping I know. But you told me that's what these forums were for.. so gripe I did.
 
#361 ·
You sure sound like you know what you're doing. Too bad you've had this bad experience with your Malibu. And, the bad experiences you've had with dealers. I'm actually suspicious of the GM dealer where I bought the '12 Malibu. But, my Chevy dealer a quarter mile down the road where I bought the '09 and where I've bought two PU trucks is fairly stellar. I've had a couple minor problems and both times the dealership owner or his brother have responded very well. Apparently they are serious about keeping an "excellent" rating with Chevy/GM. Again, I sure hope you somehow get the clicking sound remedied.
 
#362 ·
just curious as to how many of you with the vibration have cleaned your wheel hubs? i mean, it requires disassembling your brakes, but it can really help tough to solve vibration issues.

as for my story, when i bought my car, i had a really annoying vibration around 70mph. new tires fixed a lot of it, but it was still there.

last week, i put on new rear brakes so i had everything apart anyway. i took my drill with a wire brush and went to town. cleaned off almost all of the rust. my vibration is now 90% gone. i still have to do the front, but im incredibly happy with the results so far.

just something to look at before jumping into more intensive fixes.
 
#363 ·
My '11 V6 LTZ has started dong this at 44K miles. New tires all the way around, balanced twice, 4 wheel alignment done, which really didn't need to be done as it was "dead nuts on" according to the tech who did it. Also replaced brakes and rotors all the was around to no avail.

I agree it not wheels or alignment its transmission.

Some days its really bad, some days its not there at all.
I tried a little experiment the other day coming home. I held it in manual mode coming up about a 3/4 mile grade (as I always do because the trans programming on this thing really sucks), and holding between 60 and 70 in 5th gear the vibration was BAD. As soon as I back off the throttle, it almost completely goes away. The next day, same circumstances, no vibration at all.

I've also always noticed that this trans has a slight shudder in 3rd gear during mild acceleration, just momentarily, by I can tell what gear its in by the shudder. On hard acceleration however, it won't do it.

Makes me a little nervous considering I bought it used, it now has 45K on it and this issue has just started in the last 4 months.
 
#364 ·
I'm on my 3rd Gen7 and all have had the 3.6L V6. Very happy overall, but ...

My first was an '09 2LT and I did not have the vibration at any time while I had it. I bought it with 1052 miles on it and the dealership called it "new" since it was an out-of-state dealer-trade. I added 19K miles and traded it at 20,058 miles.

My second was an '11 LTZ and it had only a slight vibration every now and then. It was not enough to bother me or to do anything about, but the few times it happened I recall it being between 60-70 MPH. I bought it new (9 miles) and lost it to a flood at 44K miles.

My third is another '11 LTZ that I bought with 56K miles. It has had the vibration more than I'd like but, again, not enough to do something about. It has always been between 60-70 mph as well.

Well, around 83K I lowered my car. When installing one of the front struts the half shaft had moved outward far enough that it was no longer on the output splines in the transmission. I spun the wheel slightly while pushing inward and got it to go back onto the splines. I'm not sure that that had anything to do with my current condition, but my car now vibrates slightly between 60-70 mph quite often. When I'm in 2nd or 3rd gear accelerating from 20-30 mph it vibrates quite noticeably. I can reproduce the vibration from 20-30 anytime I want, but thankfully the vibration from 60-70 is less and somewhat random.

I believe the vibration is related to the transmission to some degree, but it also seems to be related to the half shaft's angle relative to the transmission. It could be the CV joint is a little out of spec, or the outer diameter of the inner housing is off, or the output shaft's splines and the internal splines of the half shaft don't mate well enough and they set up a small vibration.

The latter is what I would consider the best theory, but it's just a theory. To test it I'd have to loosen the strut enough to pull the wheel outward, spin it, and reinstall it. This would align the splines differently in relation to each other and might take up any slack in them, or add more and make it worse.
 
#365 ·
My thoughts on this after having the axle shafts and engine realigned per the service bulletin and having the vibration slowly come back are:

I believe the culprit is the intermediate shaft bearing. In order to quell FWD torque steer, the Malibu has equal length CV shafts on each side. For the right/passenger side there is a long fixed intermediate driveshaft with a bearing at the end bolted to the back of the engine, very similar to a carrier bearing on a RWD driveshaft. This allows the cv shafts to be a similar length and reduces torque steer. But a bearing can and will go bad. Has anybody here had this part replaced in concern with the vibration problems we are having?
 
#367 ·
not sure if this is related but after speaking to a mechanic friend he suggested pulling the abs fuse and driving the vehicle on the highway to see if when braking the vibration would go away. (note i did replace the brake pads rotor and caliper) the problem immediately went away. I am going to pull the wheel and disconnect the sensor to make sure the problem is actually the abs is the root of the cause, and will update further. if this is the problem and incase you are wondering i will have to replace the entire wheel hub assembly since there is no way to just replace the abs part.
 
#368 ·
Our Malibu vibrated quite a bit when we first got it. A little bit on the take off and some at speed 60-75mph range depending on the road type. The car had been through 2 passenger tie rods ends and 2 alignments and since it was used the dealer was not going to spend much time on the issue. Fast forward a year and the inspection (at my friends shop) finds the driver lower control are ball joint shot. He allowed me to replace it myself, so when I mean shot the ball joint friction was non-exsitent. On most cards with a ball joint that bad you can hardly drive it. I didn't feel anything that would lead me to believe it was bad let alone this bad. So after a new control arm and an alignment (we found it to be way out even though it had be aligned the year before), the vibration at speed is gone and the take off vibration is almost gone. Made a huge difference in the way it drives.
 
#370 ·
2017 1.5L 6 speed LT vibrates from @50 mph to @75mph. Done it from 1 mile on it, now has 1,000 miles and no better, no worse. Thought it would come out of it, salesman said bring er back and they will check balance on tires for me. Hesitant to do so because the lube/tire guy is very young and not very experienced with pin plate balancing, only cone balancing where center cap pops in. May try my local tire shop, I know he has a state of the art Coats and uses pin plates on wheel bolt holes.
 
#371 ·
I don't know if this is the same issue (probably not), but when we accelerate there is vibration. When we apply brakes, there is vibration. Once up to speed, the vibration mostly stops. I'm not sure whether it's A4 or A6. How do I determine that? It does have a manual shift feature (which we haven't used).
 
#372 ·
If the shifter says P R N D M then it's the A6. Otherwise it's the A4.
 
#374 · (Edited)
I bought an 09 LTZ A6 which has the vibration at 50-70. I've been reading through this thread. I'm interested in more information on ECM updates, and engine alignment. Are there any resources that provide specifics on how to check and correct engine alignment? How do you check ti see if your car has the most current ECM programming?

Thanks
 
#375 ·
Hi
I have had a 2009 2.4 malibu LT 190,000 KM for 2 years. I live in Toronto so each year I have to change summer and winter tires. This spring, I bought 4 used Pontiac alloy rims and got summer tires installed on them. From 1 year ago, the car had light vibration at 110 kph (70mph) on both summer and winter tires. But this year and after summer tires (on Pontiac rims) were installed, I can't drive faster than 70mph as the whole body shakes terrifyingly. So far I have had the wheels balanced 3 times in 2 different locations. Even this weekend I changed front wheels with original wheels (winter tires).No noticeable change at all.
A mechanic told me that it might be the hub assembly and or the drive shaft, but I don't want to spend 1000 bucks for such a try and error.

The car shakes at that speed (>110kph) even when I lift off my foot from the accelerate pedal and also when I put the gear to N. I think it shows the engine mount and the transmission are not the culprits.

The only issue with the transmission is that it vibrates at low gear when accelerating around 25 mph, and the transmission synchronizer does not shift down smoothly between 3 and 2 or 2 and 1 (clatters as if 2 metal parts collide with each other).
Within the past 2 months, front struts, driver control arm, and brake rotors have been replaced. I have not got the alignment done because I wanted to do it after all suspension repairs.

Have you guys had similar issue with your Malibu? Can you please guide me a reasonable solution? Literally I am exhausted with this car as its issues are ridiculous for a car in 21st century.
 
#376 ·
Call a dealer to see if the "3-5-R Wave Plate" issue has been addressed with your vehicle. Have the VIN available when you call.
 
#378 ·
That issue could help explain the transmission's shifting issue.

It's possible that it could be related to the vibration, but I really haven't the knowledge or skills to determine that. Mine makes a vibration between 25-30 mph under acceleration and has only since lowering it a few years ago. I'm guessing it could be the CV joints, misaligned suspension, or some combination of that and other things.
 
#379 ·
Mine vibrates exactly at 25 when accelerating, but after 30 vibration fades. If the CV joints were the cause, would those make the car shake at all speeds? I have no idea what "misaligned suspension" is, is it different from wheel alignment? Thanks for providing me with that 3-5-R wave plate clue. I will check with the local dealer to see if there has been a recall for it.
 
#380 ·
If a suspension component is misaligned, like it should be at "this" angle when that is at "that" angle, it could cause some issues or extra wear.

When I lowered mine, the sway bar links were longer to account for the change. If the sway bar was/is at a different angle than it should be when the suspension is at rest or loaded, it can change the way it reacts.

I'm just covering all the bases I can to give you and your tech(s) something to consider when looking for suspects.
 
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