[evo77]

Ok, so you've made sure the crush washers are removed from the rotors - CHECK.
The proper hubcentric rings are on your aftermarket wheels - CHECK.
And you've even had the tire shop re-balance your tires again - CHECK.

And STILL you get the vibrations on your steering wheel? Read what TireRack.com has to say:

If you have a vibration that is dependent on speed, and usually becomes noticeable around 40-45 mph and increases as your speed increases, it's probably balance related. The other primary cause of vibrations is that the tire and wheel assembly isn't perfectly round. Face it, if we go out far enough past the decimal point, nothing is perfectly round. This includes your wheels and tires. The problem is when the high spot on the tire, and the high spot on the wheel end up being matched to each other. This effectively doubles the amount of "hop" or runout. If re-balancing doesn't cure the vibration problem, have your professional installer check the runout of the tire. If there is a "hop", many times the problem can be fixed by simply rotating the tire on the wheel slightly. The technician should loosen the tire on the wheel, and turn it 180 degrees, and reinflate the tire after relubricating the bead. The runout should be significantly reduced or eliminated, and if it's not, try it again, but this time rotate only 90 degrees, and if that doesn't work, try 180 degrees on the third try. Done this way, the high spot on the tire has been tried at each quarter of the wheel. At one of those points, the tire should be good and round. At that point, rebalance the tire, and go for a test drive. If the vibration persists, the problem is either in the tire, or elsewhere in the vehicle.

Follow TireRack's Vibration Diagnosis Flow Chart to self diagnose your vibration issue:

Here is also some interesting info from neons.org...

"Neons are sensitive to wheel balance. If it is not perfect, it induces a resonance that causes steering wheel shimmy. We call it 73mph shake. At the factory, Neon wheel and tire assemblies are balanced within 1/8 of an ounce. Most other tire stores and such can only balance within 1/4 of an ounce and thats assuming that their wheel balancer is calibrated properly (rare) and the guy knows how to run the machine. The resonance occurs due to the front lower control arm rear bushing. When this bushing gets worn, the shake certainly gets worse. To cover all your bases in eliminating the shimmy, make sure your wheels are really balanced. Next, replace the front lower control arm rear bushings (you'll need an arbor press). If you want to reduce the sensitivity to wheel balance and move the resonant frequency (speed at which shimmy happens) up, install some stiffer bushings like the polyurethane Energy Suspension pieces in place of the factory ones. They will definitely make the car ride more harshly over small bumps because the wheel will not recess reward, but hey, everything's a compromise. If we made the car less sensitive to wheel balance without hurting ride harshness, the car would loose its precise steering and handling that everyone loves. Can you say Escort?"

 

[evo77]

Those of you that were able to diagnose the cause of your vibrations (other than hub rings or removing crush washers) please share your results so that others may try the same thing.

 

[KDiggityDog]

Still got the "Shimmy" but it's no party

Those of you that were able to diagnose the cause of your vibrations (other than hub rings or removing crush washers) please share your results so that others may try the same thing.

So I just installed my hubcentric rings ($15 from Discount Tire) and double checked to make sure my crush washers had been removed, and I still have a damn 73mph shimmy! :ben: Talk about frustration! So anyway, I want to try the balance and round recommendations, and maybe get my tire rotated around the rim 90 or 180 degrees. Does anyone have any recommendations for a shop in northern California that can balance a wheel to within an 1/8th of an oz. as was mentioned in the neons.org posting? Or will I have to have that done at the dealer?

 

[reed32]

Those of you that were able to diagnose the cause of your vibrations (other than hub rings or removing crush washers) please share your results so that others may try the same thing.

So I just installed my hubcentric rings ($15 from Discount Tire) and double checked to make sure my crush washers had been removed, and I still have a damn 73mph shimmy! :ben: Talk about frustration! So anyway, I want to try the balance and round recommendations, and maybe get my tire rotated around the rim 90 or 180 degrees. Does anyone have any recommendations for a shop in northern California that can balance a wheel to within an 1/8th of an oz. as was mentioned in the neons.org posting? Or will I have to have that done at the dealer?

wheel works in antioch (30 mins from you). ask for gustavo. he owns a srt-4

 

[DiGiTaLReApEr]

I've been dealing with the vibration problem now with my winter tires for a 3 years. The first year was perfect, then progressively got worse over the past 2 years. I'm dreading putting my winter tires on tomorrow for this exact reason.

I have to use spacers on my 16" rims or else the front calipers rub on the rims. I find if the spacers aren't EXACTLY centered I get vibration. It normally takes me 4-5 adjustments and trials to get the vibrations to stop. The vibrations happen at like 90km/h and up.

Alignment seems to be a huge issue as well. Get your car aligned or at least a diagnostic to see if you're out. I found once my alignment got too far out the vibrations would never go away.

Other than that all I can say is good luck, I've found the SRT-4 to be extremely sensitive to any other tires/rim setup except for the stock. It's a pain in the ass but manageable.

 

[SRT-4aKid's Brother]

I had to post my experience since I just fixed the car (wish I would have consulted that Tire Rack chart earlier).

I had bad steering wheel vibrations at freeway speeds that progressively got worse as speed picked up. I started with getting the wheels balanced, but that didn't help. I had also just in the past two months replaced the wheel bearings, so I new that wasn't the problem.

Turns out the issue was the LCA bushings. I had the aftermarket prothane bushings with maybe 15k miles on them, but after replacing them the vibrations have gone away.