Evenin' all.

Had my FL2 over a week now and I've not broken down, hurrah! I do have an annoying niggle though, vibration!

When driving at motorway speeds there is pronounced vibration through the vehicle, to such an extent that I noticed the whole passenger seat juddering away.

Anyway, my initial thoughts were wheel balancing. No obvious weights on any wheels. Running 4 pretty equally well worn Continentals. Have been to local tyre garage who discovered both offside wheels with no weights and both nearside ones not balanced correctly. One wheel/tyre is so far out that it can't be balanced due to the amount of weight required won't physically fit on the wheel. Wheel looks ok, issue appears to be the tyre. 3 other tyres all balanced.

Vibration still exists. Have tried running with the spare on to pinpoint if this particular tyre is the issue but it's difficult to tell because it's not a full size spare so is limited to 50mph and the vibration is most pronounced at 70mph. Testing inconclusive.

Do we think a severe inbalance in one wheel is sufficient to cause this considerable vibration at motorway speeds? There's no noise associated with it.

Also difficult for me to judge as I've not driven any other FL2s on the motorway.

Any thoughts welcome. Thanks.

or rear diff bearing? At work
At home

"I can't always believe facts I read on the web" - Charles Dickens

winner by default of the tractor vs caravan race

Yeh diff bearing had been a thought....but from what I've read, it's usually associated with noise? It's a definite possibility though.

Vibration when cruising in Drive, accelerating in Drive or it's there even if the car is in Neutral at that speed?
Meaning you should try to figure it out if it's because of the powertrain or it's wheels' balance related.

Thanks Alex. Yeh I've had a little play at slipping it into neutral on some A roads but inconclusive so far. It's definitely there cruising in drive at 70mph and under acceleration at high speeds.

Not much point in looking for the vibration source until all wheels are properly balanced. If a particular tyre won't balance, bin it and get one that will. John
07 HSE Narvick Black
Land Rover Series One
Triumph Rocket 111 (sadly gone!)

Problem is that all 4 tyres are well worn so would need to replace all, so that's £600, which is £600 less available to spend on repairing the vibration issue if it's not the tyres.

I appreciate your problem. However, you could spend a lot of time, effort and money trying to diagnose the vibration issue only to find that the problem disappears when you fit new tyres (as it seems you will have to shortly). Do you know any other FL2 owners near you who might "lend" you a set of wheels for a test? John
07 HSE Narvick Black
Land Rover Series One
Triumph Rocket 111 (sadly gone!)

The cars pre MY2011 are prone to this kind of vibrations given by the powertrain's characteristics.
It seems that LR is knowing this and therefore the MY2011 and later were equipped with some kind of vibration dampers, one on the front frame and one on the rear end of the drive shaft, just before the Haldex.
See the pictures below.

Click image to enlarge

Greetings Surfingmonkey
I have a 2009 22.000 mls. auto. with a viberation problem. It started at 15.000 mls. Its been in the dealership three times, total of six days and they could not fix it. They called in a chap from Landrover who had a test drive and said, yes it has viberation its a characterization of the vehicle. The warranty expires in two weeks. I am now locked in mortal combat with customer services.
There is a thread somewhere in the forum by a chap who had a viberation problem, went down the legal path but had to give up. You need very deep pockets to take on Landrover.
And yes, the first thing I did was put four new tyres on. Best of luck.

surfingmonkey wrote:

Yeh diff bearing had been a thought....but from what I've read, it's usually associated with noise? It's a definite possibility though.

Ive just had my rear diff bearing done, didnt cause any vibration of any sort just a whine that came on over a period of 3 days, all fixed now, back to its normal quiet smooth self again

Bit of an update....

Appear to have identified that the out of balance wheel/tyre is the culprit. Swapped the dodgy wheel for a full size spare kindly loaned by Andy (mcphersonstrut) and vehicle ran fine. Will hopefully have acquired a replacement wheel/tyre this week and will update once fitted.

Thanks to all for their advice.

Dave

Replacement wheel/tyre combo fitted today and vibration gone