Do all 1 piece driveshafts vibrate?

[crcpdx]

I bought a cf DSS driveshaft and it vibrates. Not bad, but at 60 I can feel it in the steering wheel. Are all 1 pieces going to vibrate a little?

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[Kermitz]

My Shaftmasters doesn't vibrate.
MT or AT?
Have you tried "clocking" the driveshaft?

 

[Hye Power]

My one piece aluminum one doesnt from dss.

 

[sabtaj1]

My QA1 does a lil. But I’ve changed a lot on rear end. I have the Steeda alignment pin kit that I need to install. Heard that does the trick but haven’t done it yet. Soon I hope.

 

[GregO]

Are all 1 pieces going to vibrate a little?

2015 Shaftmaster Aluminum installed for 2.5 years. Zero vibration.
Did you receive a balancing certificate from DSS ?

 

[MRGTX]

That's a good question. I'm inclined to say that they probably do but usually it's below the background NVH and we can't sense it. One piece aluminum (and carbon) shafts, reputable ones at least, are usually advertised as being dynamically balanced. As with any mechanical part, they're built to a tolerance. Usually, the tighter the tolerance, the higher the price. If you were building a 250mph salt flat car, a $10,000 shaft might be worth the money but most of us are thinking <$1000 so there's only so much they can do.

If you happen to get one that's at the far end of the tolerances, there may be perceptible vibration. Depending on your application, there could be a situation where you could have a precisely balanced shaft but you just happen to hit a natural harmonic of an aluminum tube of a specific thickness/diameter/length. Just speculating there....

So two piece shafts are used specifically to avoid this problem...or so I have read. There may be a crash safety issue here too...not sure. Keep in mind that most older cars have 1 piece shafts... but then again, they were usually steel and smaller in diameter so they may have been more resistant to vibration and did so at a lower amplitude when it did happen.

So my two experiences with modern 1 piece performance car driveshafts-

My pops has one on his tuned 2007 GT500...IIRC it's from Shaftmasters but I can't remember for sure. It definitely vibrates but only slightly and only at certain speeds. I'm usually too full of adrenaline and frankly sweating bullets from trying to keep that beast under control to notice but it bothers him. I think if it was any more severe, he would have pulled it and sent it back but it's very slight.

Second, my one piece shaft in my Dart Sport doesn't seem to vibrate but there's a lot of noise in that car so it could be happening. Again, it's an application-specific thing. A 48 year old car with headers right below the floor boards isn't going to communicate vibrations like that as easily. Your Mustang is a heck of a lot smoother and more refined.

It's worth looking into...perhaps calling the manufactuer and asking them how to evaluate the severity and risk....and definitely worth installing a driveshaft loop if you don't already have one.

 

[Rapid Red]

Believe it or not sometimes a drive shaft has run out, cause it is defective.

No vibration before install, now vibration. Suggest before you call the manufacture. Go back in and check the install.

When installing, this goes for both ends. Did you rotate, sung all the bolts. Allowing the mating surfaces to aline. Then go back and tighten to spec.

Tossing out ideas, not making judgement of ones skill level.

Clocking should not be needed, drive shafts are trued & balanced.

I had a drive shaft made for another car. Thinking it's a perfect world fought vibration. Adjusting & checking pinion angle of a newly built car.

After several attempts, pulled the drive shaft, had it checked. Guess what ?

I 've order an aluminum drive shaft from Denny's service and it was perfect. Moral of the story, if could be and is posable to get a bad part.

And don't start adding shit (drive shaft loop) until you find the problem.

Want a drive shaft loop all well and good, after the vibration is corrected.

 

[wazslow]

I recently installed a dynotech driveshaft in my car and haven't noticed any vibration.

 

[Plimmer]

I bought a cf DSS driveshaft and it vibrates. Not bad, but at 60 I can feel it in the steering wheel. Are all 1 pieces going to vibrate a little?

DSS stuff is cheap junk, mine vibrated so badly I threw it away. Got a QA1 now and it’s a million times better.

 

[Dominant1]

To answer your question, No. I have a 1 piece Dynotech aluminum ds and it doesn’t vibrate. If they do there are a few things you can do. One of them is to flip the ds 180 degrees. Also 1/4 inch spacers in between the frame and your transmission crossmember fixes vibrations also..if neither of these 2 things work then there’s something wrong with the shaft itself.

 

[Silveryote]

I bought a DSS a couple of months ago and had a local shop install it for me. It vibrated so badly we couldn't even drive the car. While my car was up on the lift we could stand under my car with engine running and in "drive" and visibly see the front and spacer spinning out of true where it mounted to the transmission. My mechanic that installed it is also a machinist. He put the spacer on his lathe to check it with his gauges. It was 8000 of an inch out of true. DSS told us that this was acceptable because the driveshaft and spacer were balanced together to fix that. LOL
My mechanic rotated the driveshaft 180 degrees with the spacer to test the theory. Nope it still vibrated bad.
I had to send it back to DSS at my expense "$47" so they could repair it under warranty. It was brand new, I didn't want it repaired. I wanted another one or my money back.
After about a month of fussing back and forth, they finally refunded my money.
Lesson learned, I'll just continue using my stock driveshaft.

 

[WildHorse]

DSS stuff is cheap junk

Cheap is debatable , junk definitely . And so is there half shafts . Specifically , their 800 hp ones. Had a buddy rockwell hardness test the DSS CV's. Stock is stronger.

 

[Plimmer]

Cheap is debatable , junk definitely . And so is there half shafts . Specifically , their 800 hp ones. Had a buddy rockwell hardness test the DSS CV's. Stock is stronger.

Not surprising, my DSS half shafts wore out after about 300 miles. CV joint starting clacking. And the rubber boots they use are paper thin and likely already broken when they ship their product.

I bought a DSS a couple of months ago and had a local shop install it for me. It vibrated so badly we couldn't even drive the car. While my car was up on the lift we could stand under my car with engine running and in "drive" and visibly see the front and spacer spinning out of true where it mounted to the transmission. My mechanic that installed it is also a machinist. He put the spacer on his lathe to check it with his gauges. It was 8000 of an inch out of true. DSS told us that this was acceptable because the driveshaft and spacer were balanced together to fix that. LOL
My mechanic rotated the driveshaft 180 degrees with the spacer to test the theory. Nope it still vibrated bad.
I had to send it back to DSS at my expense "$47" so they could repair it under warranty. It was brand new, I didn't want it repaired. I wanted another one or my money back.
After about a month of fussing back and forth, they finally refunded my money.
Lesson learned, I'll just continue using my stock driveshaft.

Same story with me. Sent the DSS driveshaft back because it vibrated so badly I couldn’t use the car. After 4 months of fussing they sent the piece of shit back to me un-repaired, and told me I should put the factory rubber bushings back into my car to absorb the vibration. What a joke of a company.

 

[wazslow]

After reading horror stories about DSS, I went with a dynotech driveshaft and gforce halfshafts.

 

[WildHorse]

There was a time when all driveshafts were one piece (and I wish they still were)

Nothing wrong with the 2 piece.. Other than their a tad heavier. Had a 64 Pontiac that had a two piece driveshaft. That 430 Pontiac engine couldn't kill it.

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