Vibrations on the Highway and Strange Tire Wear

144ps · Post by **144ps** » 23 Aug 2026, 11:20

Hi everyone,

today, after my vacation (during which the car sat idle for almost 3 weeks), I drove 200 km on the highway. Starting at 100 km/h, I felt vibrations like those caused by unbalanced tires.
The steering wheel wobbled slightly back and forth, and I could also see the vibrations on the smartphone mount and feel them in my legs.

The car also pulls to the right on the highway.
I haven’t hit any curbs, and the last wheel alignment was 12 months ago.

When I got home, I noticed that the front right tire has gouges in the tread and is heavily worn on the outer sidewall. The other tires don’t look like that.

What could be the problem here? The car was driving completely normally before the vacation.

Over the past two years, I've replaced everything on the front axle except for the axial joints. Could these be the cause of a tire failure like this due to misalignment?

Thanks and best regards from Berlin

Post by **misha** » 24 Aug 2026, 05:23

How old the tyres are?
See what DOT code says.
It could be that they are turned to plastic.

It could be anything from control arms(ball joint,bushings) to inner or outer tie rods...struts.

Post by **misha** » 24 Aug 2026, 05:26

How old the tyres are?
See what DOT code says.
It could be that they are turned to plastic.

It could be anything from control arms(ball joint,bushings) to inner or outer tie rods...struts.

Or ...something simple like fallen out weights or under inflated tyre.

Tyres on 850 should be inflated at 2.5 bar to 2.7 bar if loaded.

Post by **scot850** » 24 Aug 2026, 08:51

Agreed, those tires look really old. Also when they are old tires, when left standing for a length of time like 3 weeks they can get 'flat spotted' on the area that was being compressed by the car's weight on the ground. This may or may not come back out with use.

If you do not know how to check the age of the tires, most have a 4 digit number in an oval near the rim. It is WWYY (first 2 digits the week of the year with January 1st starting WW = 01 and YY is the year. so for this year it is 26. I was shipped a set of 'new' tires and when they arrived they were actually 5 years old! The tire dealer said they consider them 'new' until 7 years old!!

Neil.

S Carlson · Post by **S Carlson** » 24 Aug 2026, 21:43

Even if the tires are old, I am assuming they are all the same age, but one has abnormal wear that the others lack. I would venture to guess there's a suspension problem of some sort, and not wholly to blame on tires.

I would raise the car on the front right and wiggle things around to check for looseness. Check the ball joint on the control arm. That has caused minor speed shimmy around 100kph (62mph) for me. Check also the control arm bushings. The rubber in these can separate from the steel shells and then the control arm will be able to slide forward and backward. I had this happen on a P80 Volvo and when I applied the brakes, the steering wheel would twist and the car would slightly pull to one side.

Because you mention doing a lot of suspension work in the past two years, it might be a good idea to check the bolts holding the strut to the steering swivel member. These are known to come loose if not tightened properly. Also, even if the control arm bushings are new, they can fail prematurely if they were tightened with the car in the air, without putting weight on the control arm to get the bushing to its "natural" angle before tightening them up. If you didn't do that, the bushings will fail very very quickly, as the rubber inside will be twisted with the car on the ground. I have seen it happen.

CV joints in the drive axle could cause a speed shimmy, but they would have to be pretty bad to do that. You would be able to feel play in them with the car stopped, brake on, in neutral and then turning/wiggling the axle by hand.

144ps · Post by **144ps** » 25 Aug 2026, 01:51

Thanks for all your replies. The tires are all from early 2019. I have an appointment at the repair shop in two days; I'll let you know if they find anything.
I forgot to mention: Both drive shafts were also replaced a year ago (SKF parts), so I don't think they're defective.

Post by **scot850** » 25 Aug 2026, 08:37

We owned a 93 850 GLT a long time ago that was our daughter's first car. Not long after buying from a Volvo specialist one of the front CV boots failed under warranty. They replaced the axle with an aftermarket one. The car always had a vibration no matter what I did. I replaced all the suspension over time with Bilstein shocks, wheel bearings and more. It wasn't until not long before we sold the car the CV boot failed again. By then I had read about the variable quality of aftermarket axles so went to the junkyard and pulled an OE axle in good condition. After fitting that one (the short LH one) the car suddenly had no more vibration. In fact the car ran a whole lot smoother and was running the best it had while we owned it. So, be careful of assuming that because you have replaced parts they are all 'good' parts.

Good Luck!

Neil.

144ps · Post by **144ps** » 31 Aug 2026, 01:26

At the shop they found that the left tie rod had a bit of play. I had both replaced, the alignment adjusted and winter tires installed.
The problem is now almost fixed, but i still feel vibrations under load. So soon i‘ll be removing the PU inserts from the subframe‘s bushings.
The problems were a combination of several factorrs then.

I also bought some original second hand hubcaps and I think they look really great on the 850.

Best regards from Berlin

Post by **misha** » 31 Aug 2026, 05:11

You have eaten tyre on the right side...so....a bit of play on the left side would eat the tyre on that side.

Check control arms ball joints and bushings,strut mounts and....i suppose that they allready checked inner tie rods for play.

144ps · Post by **144ps** » 16 Sep 2026, 12:18

Hi everyone,

I didn't express myself clearly last time (due to my English skills). Of course, it was the inner tie rods that were replaced, not the outer ones. The inner tie rods were already sagging and no longer stiff, but that didn't solve the problem.

So the vibration issues are still there, so I’m now trying to figure out what’s wrong on my own before I spend the entire value of the car on labor at a repair shop again.

Because of the vibrations, I had a new set of wheels installed -> test drive on the highway -> same result.

So I jacked up the front end on stands and had the wheels turned transmission on D. At first, I didn’t notice anything, but when I accelerated, I could feel extreme vibrations throughout the entire body of the car.
I felt along the driveshafts and control arms and detected slight radial and vertical play in the driveshaft on the driver’s side.
I removed the driver’s-side wheel and put the car back in drive -> same effect, same vibrations.

So one of the SKF driveshafts is already defective again after just one year, and I’ll be looking for a new original one at the scrap yard.

Neil & Carlson, you were right with your guess!

Best regards from Berlin