96 Explorer XLT 4.0

I drove about 200 miles over the 4th of July. Went "off roading" on the beach a tiny bit, less than a mile total.
On the drive home, I noticed a vibration in the steering wheel.
Got out and checked the tires and noticed a wheel weight missing from my front passenger. Assumed that was the vibration.
Had the tires balanced at Discount Tire, did not solve my issue.
So I took it in for an alignment at Tires Plus and to have them do a complete vehicle inspection.
They told me one tire had a "flat spot" and one tire had some uneven wear, recommended new tires. They swapped the tires around and it actually improved the vibration, no where near as bad as it was on the way home from camping.
I just took it in to my local Midas. They called and said it has a warped driveshaft and because of that it will have damaged the transfer case and rear diff. Quoted around 2500 for everything. I asked how badly the tcase and diff were damaged and she literally said "we wont know if they are actually damaged until we open it up". It's under new management so I don't know the manager anymore and am having trouble trusting what they say.
My first impulse is to get a used driveshaft and install that to solve the issue. I just need this thing to last another year, I just dropped 3k on the transmission after replacing the engine in December. My wife is going to kill me one of these days.
Any thoughts? I'm considering taking it somewhere else for a second opinion but every dollar I spend on this pushes me closer to being murdered

 

I doubt your drive shaft just all of the sudden got warped, unless you did something 4 wheeling.
If any thing maybe a u joint going bad, but if it got better swapping the tires around I would think it's tire related.
Let us know if you find the problem.
Good Luck and Take Care!

 

I agree, a "warped" driveshaft would not get better by swapping tires around, unless you have more than one issue. Also consider that if swapping tires around helped, the tire that was causing the issue is still on the vehicle, so it's totally possible the bad tire is still causing the remaining vibration. Your Explorer likely has a full size spare tire. Maybe you should rotate that in to see if you can isolate the bad tire and, hopefully, the vibration as well.

-Rod

 

Sorry to resurrect an old thread, but I forgot I had posted this!
I am STILL dealing with issues with the front suspension and vibration, and trying to sniff out the issue.

Tires plus ended up saying that the tie rod ends were bad, so they were replaced. This did not fix the vibration, but has lead to an unsolvable alignment issue. I have taken the explorer to 3 different tires plus locations to get aligned (I have lifetime alignment), and every time they say "we get this side adjusted and locked down, and as soon as we adjust the centric on the other side... it kicks it back out of alignment"
I told them the tie rods were replaced but they always say "the tie rods affect the toe, it would not cause camber issues"
I feel like the tie rods could certainly cause camber issues especially if someone one sides camber is affecting the other sides camber, right??

Also, regarding the vibration....
The driveshaft was found to have "run out" and was repaired and balanced. Ride is MUCH smoother but still have vibration over 80mph.

I have brand new tires on it for winter and am hoping to get all these issues resolved before I ruin new tires.

Any ideas?
Thanks all! Be well

 

I should also mention I had my rack and pinion replaced as well

 

Just a thought, could the rack and pinion mounting bolts be loose?

 

I guess I could take a look under there to see, but it was replaced after the vibration issue started because it was failing.

One thing I just noticed today is it vibrates worse when I let off the gas around 77-80 before it starts vibrating constantly. From 75-80ish it is pretty smooth while accelerating.

I've got a secret stash of money accumulating so I can eventually take it in to a shop if needed (my wife may literally kill me if she knows I spent another dollar keeping this thing on the road, she hates it) but I'm hoping someone may have some idea of what may be going on.