Small vibration\rubbing

[scottmcc]

Hello all
Been gone for a while, I moved to Naples Florida 5 months ago from Muskegon Mi and love it. Get to drive the Viper year round. Anyways, last friday took the car to a local shop next to where I work for an oil change. As they were backing the car down off the car lift I heard a terrible noise, just as the rear tires hit the concrete off the ramps. It was like something broke or snapped then like a tool being dropped on the concrete floor. The Mechanic stopped and I said what the freak was that. He did not know. We looked the car over good and saw a slight rub on the ramp where the frame rubbed but what I heard was more than that.
I left and went home and during my drive home I could feel a vibration in my steering. It was raining real hard so I thought it must be the rain. Yesterday morning I drove it and there is clearly a problem. At 5 - 10 mph you can feel a definate vibration, especially when you turn. I immediately returned the car to the garage.

Could what I heard be something to do with the emergency brake? Cable? Causing the brakes to rub?

1997 RT\10 42,000 miles

Scott

 

[DrumrBoy]

Wow, I have no idea how to explain the observed symptoms. The parking brake affects the rear brakes, so it would have no bearing on your steering. Did you look underneath....as in check the front suspension and steering components?

 

[AZTVR]

Has your car had the 998 and 999 recall fixes done? And even if they were, maybe they were not done correctly or a crack had already developed?
http://forums.viperclub.org/threads/589985-998-recall

The only other thing that I would add is that I have read a couple of threads about front A-arm/control arms cracking. Also, I have heard that the bracket that the control arm mounts to on the frame, can have the weld fail. Those would be bad things to drive with.

Your issue sounds like something where you may have had some crack developing and then when the frame had an extra force applied to it by dragging on the ramp, the crack finally propagated to an open and that's the "pop" you heard? If this is the case, then you may have been lucky that it happened where it did, rather than someday when you were out driving enthusiastically.

 

[dave6666]

Flat spot? Worn hub? Check air pressure?

 

[alwayscode390]

Atleast the guy heard it too ---

 

[plumcrazy]

i broke an A arm on mine at very low speeds (maybe 25-30mph). at least thats when it reared its ugly head. id get it up on a lift a take a good, hard look at them. its going to be tough to see any hairline cracks though....

the a arm/control arm issue has popped up a few times in the past. i just dont know if it would make noise at low speeds. but i do remember mine making a snap or pop at crawling speeds when i turned the wheel a few hours prior to it breaking.

 

[scottmcc]

I dropped the car off at F1 imports and exotics in Naples today. They work alot with Lambo's, Ferrari's and some Vipers. http://www.f1imports.com/
You can feel the vibration for a second or two from low RPM's in first and second.

His initial thought is that its the clutch and the pop i heard was probably from the lift..(Just a coincidence)

What is a standard price for a shop to put a new clutch in?

I will let you all know what they find out.

Thanks

Scott

 

[dave6666]

About 4 hours plus parts.

 

[scottmcc]

The Technician and F1 Imports found the problem to be the exhaust. When he loosened the exhaust system, all the vibration went away. That did not make sense to me as it did not do that before the oil change. I went back to the shop where I had the oil changed and asked them if they did anything to my exhaust. They said "Oh yeah, while we were under there we found a bracket that was broken so we tacked it up for you, No Charge!"

So that explains the new vibration.

The F1 Tech said the additional weld and the fact the mounts and exhaust are old would take a few more hours to fix completely as he would need to take the side sills off etc and tweak the pipes.. I said if your doing that, lets just put a Borla system on and be done with it.
He agreed.

So that's what I am going to do.

Quote is on its way. I am going to search the forum for what others have used for exhaust. I have seen others talk about B&B..

Thanks