Background-

97 GXE with AT and 145,000 miles. Well taken care of. Just installed new half shafts both sides due to CV joint boot failures. Synthetic Castrol AT fluid is down by 1/4 inch from HOT line, or 1/2 way between two notches on dipstick when warm but not hot. Fluid is still pink / purple and smells OK. I run Shell V-power 93 RON and I don't abuse anything.

Now, I have a shudder which seems to increase frequency as car accelerates only in second gear. It is worse when going uphill from a standing start or under hard acceleration on level ground. No CEL codes, no sudden decrease in mileage, no power loss so I doubt it is a bad coil pack or injector and no real vibration or shudder or in first or third / fouth. I can't honestly swear the shudder started at the exact same time as the half shaft replacement but I believe it did, and it seems to be getting progressively worse. I also notice an occasional slight whine or hum at interstate speeds 70 - 80 mph at 2300 - 2600 rpm. Sounded a bit like when lug nuts on an alloy wheel are backing off and roadwheel is becoming loose. Again, this noise is not always present. It seems worse when things are well warmed up.

Obviously, with the problem showing up after recent half shaft replacement this coincidence leads one to suggest a bad half shaft but why would this not show up in all gears? Is it simply a matter of harmonics? Has anyone else had a bad half shaft and if so, did your symptoms correlate with mine? What else might it be? Can low fuel pressure due to a plugged injector or filter lead to this kind of vibration without a CEL code showing up?

(Autozone Limited Lifetime Warranty re-manufactured shafts, but who is going to argue in favor of the shaft being bad if there is no perceptible wear, looseness, etc?)

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

 

A little bit different here as I have a 5spd but I had to go through 3 halfshafts until I got one that didnt have a low frequency vibration under acceleration which was strongest in 2nd and 3rd gears. It was worse when accelerating through a corner though and i'm sure everyone else on here will say its the tranny but you asked and i did have a similar problem. BTW the 1st 2 were from autozone and the one that didnt vibrate was a different brand from advanced.

 

I will never again purchase an Autozone re-man axle, they are notorious for similiar vibrations. Funny people dog on rebuilding them yourself, for me it's either 1: rebuild MYSELF with napa boot so I know everything is kept in balance. 2: Napa Max-drive NEW axle's are good. 3: Raxle's are the shiz.

 

Sounds like my situation a few years back, Basically a sticking inner cv
joint soon after I put on two Autozone axles, resulted in a shudder -only on acceleration and at a specific speed range. Yanked them both out,
took them back and told them they were defective. Autozone gave
me replacements under LT warranty with no hassle. The replacements
have been fine for 4 years/ nearly 100 k miles.

 

I recently had my right axle go bad. So I ordered a new one from raxles. Two days after I placed the order the driver side went bad. I didn't have the cash to spend on another 170$ raxle and didn't have the time to wait for a second axle in the mail so I went to napa and got a reman for 40$ and boy was this thing a piece of **** it looked like it had been broken down the center of the shaft and very crudely welded back together. I asked for a different one they said there were no other axles available and assured me that if annything goes wrong they will replace it. So I install both axles (the raxle is really worth the cash nicely made) and emediately I feel a small vibration during acceleration coming from the side with the napa axle. The napa axle is bad as I thought and when it gets a little worse I'm bringing it back. The morel of this story is that auto part remans are usually crap and that is why marty at raxles does so well because his are quality. If your not getting the axle from nissan or raxles or rebuilding yourself you'll probably got through a few before you get a good one.

 

just to add on my comment, the first 2 bad axles I put in were new, not remanned.

 

please say they werent cardone?? lmao

i did passenger side axle cause it was clicking used cardone axle looked really nice tho not a reman but new it looked really nice carrier bearing worked nicely no looseness anywhere anyway now drivers side vibrates when turning left ?? anyway ordered drivers side too now most likely if passenger was bad drivers isnt too fat behind or maybe is and just not dried up to click. anyway im hoping i wont have a vibrating nightmare when i put another cardone axle in the drivers side??? could also jus need realignment i suppose but seems only camber would have been affected and didtn undo balljoint just removed shock gives u much more room.

ps car is dropped 2"

 

i noticed to cardone axles are made in Canada the home of the LSD Maxima im sure its got to be fairly good quality. Judging from there site there proud of there reputation.. lets hope it doesn't precede them lol
$65 wit shipping www.rockauto.com

motorvate.ca = Max enthus 2nd cousin

 

Thanks for the input. I have done some more drivability experiments and concur with the post above, the shudder is on acceleration only and within a fairly low speed range regardless of which gear I'm in. I am getting new axles this weekend and will check for backlash and radial TIR on the shafts in the car if I can get the indicator mounted somewhere stable. I'll post results after I change one at a time until I get rid of the shudder. Most annoying.

 

"Annoying doesnt describe it for an OCD Max lover such as myself"

let me know how it goes

 

It was replacing the left half axle that did the trick. Returned to A-zone, no problems, money back.

Seems the outer CV joint "knuckle" could have a crack which opens a bit on high torque (acceleration) and stays closed during cruise or light acceleration. So, I pass it on for those of you who may come across this failure someday. Let's hope the replacements are better.

 

lol dont get me going on that read my thread about my axle adventure