Floating / Dancing Rear??
 

I don't know how to better describe this. For the most part, my Max handles fine. Sometimes at around 70mph the rear begins to move side-to-side a little. It's sort of a wobble like maybe a loose wheel, bad bushing. I can't see anything wrong, though. The car only has 2,000 mles on it. Any ideas?

Rear beam axle, crappy factory suspension, tires?, etc.

What kind of turn are we talking about here???
Remember, this car is a family sedan, not a sports car, it's limits are alot less than that of the 350Z or something.

Mike

Thanks for the response. I'm not talking about any turn. This happens when driving straight down the freeway. At first I wanted to think it might be that the car was front heavy, but from all my reading here I haven't found anything that resembles what I'm experiencing.

please post your car setup, that may help also.

tire pressure, wheel size, tire brand, suspension, etc

I know that when I first bought my 4th gen I30 that when one stock tires and suspension, going 70 on the highwat wasn't fun, and my handling wasn't reassuring. When I got nice tires and a quality drop all that changed.

It could be something as simple as a blown shock in the rear causing unwanted motion. If you care about how your car handles, plan on lowering it. Good luck.

if it's only got 2000 miles on it, I'm going to assume it's still under warranty.. take it back to the dealer and describe the problem. it's very possible you have a bad bushing or something loose in the rear. have them put it up on the rack and check things over.

I think that's what I'll have to do. Yeah, it's still under warranty. I've got six years or 72,000 miles worth of that. I'll have to take a day off work as soon as the kids start their summer break. Everything on the car is still stock, right down to the air in the tires. I want to get this figured out before I go installing the lowering springs, sway bar, and hopefully struts as well.

Definitely get it fixed before you even think about touching the suspension... the second you stick a sway bar or drop springs on it, nissan will claim the problem is due to excessive lowering and try to weasel their way out of it.

:Orly:
404: rear beam axle on 6th Gen not found

but unless you're looking to upgrade your suspension to fix this, this thread may work better in the 6th forum :gotme:

I think it's a combination of things.

One is aerodynamics, and if you most notice this when following in the wake of an 18-wheeler with a box (rather than a flatbed) or a bus that's at least part of your problem. Tires with better lateral rigidity or wider rims should help.

Another is bushing stiffness-related, and I'll note that IRS cars can feel a little nervous/woozy. I'd start the troubleshooting with the rear alignment settings (you might benefit from a little more toe-in, with it being set to the same amount on each rear wheel).

Norm

Woops.
I didn't even notice this was on a 6G.
never mind.

heh, hes only got 2k miles in 2006, what could it be?

Actually, this is ONE reason why a beam-axle setup is considered superior for highway cruising vs. IRS in many cases. Since both sides of the IRS suspension act independently, there is the possibility (if the dampening is not correct) that the car will feel a bit loose in the back - whereas in a torsion beam setup this is generally not a problem......

Everyone always says that Nissan did a torsion beam because they're "cheap" and all that crap. IMO Nissan did it to make the car a more stable and comfortable cruising car, and to give it more of a "RWD Feel".....I can't see how the torsion beam costs any less to make than IRS does, anyhow...

Fewer separate pieces, fewer pivot points to maintain dimensional tolerances on, and quite a bit less engineering and test/tune development time come to mind.

But I agree with stability as a reason for going with a twist beam. According to a guy I know from another forum who gets paid by an OE to do this sort of stuff, you can get pretty good general behavior from this arrangement without any serious drawbacks. At some level of performance, "pretty good" might not really be good enough, but that's likely well above the level at which most of the target customers were expected to be pushing it. It's only anecdotal evidence, but very few drivers corner much past 0.3 lateral g and almost nobody ever goes above 0.6g.

Actually, if they had gone to a beam with reasons of "cheaping out" being the primary consideration, lateral location of the rear beam would almost certainly be with a Panhard rod instead of the Scott-Russell link.

Norm

My 06 Maxima is the 4th car I've owned with IRS. Two of them (95 T-Bird, 93 Altima) rode great and didn't have any of the symptoms this car has. The other car (96 Cobra w/ IRS swapped from a 03 Cobra) has this same condition but not as severe. I get a slight side-to-side movement but not the noticeable wobble that the Max has. It seems to happen randomly at most any speed. I've noticed it at 70mph. I've noticed at around 40mph. It really feels like it has to be some bushing. Hopefully, I can get a dealer to check it out next week.