So I drive a 3.4L V6 2001 Oldsmobile Alero (2-Door) ...

The ride as of lately hasn't been as easy or comfortable as it once was ... the best way I can describe it is as if I'm driving and my tires fall into another groove and the car sways a little. The only thing is, its not the tires (because I just changed from my winter tires to my all-season tires here in Toronto, Ontario (Canada).

We're guessing it might be the struts / shocks that's throwing me off while I drive, but I just wanted to see if anyone has experienced this with their own Alero.


More Details: It will do it at any speed, whether I'm driving 20km or 100km on the highway ... it's not CONSTANT but its every so often that I'm feeling this "Shake" that the car does ... again, the best way I can describe it is as if I have bad tires with already bad indents in them and I'm driving along and the car falls into the indents, causing the car to groove with it.
It's like a car on ice ... shaky, wavy, un-easy ...

Looking for some suggestions before I spend a small fortune trying to diagnose this problem. Thanks!

 

When was the last time it had an alignment? How many miles/kms do you have?

 

This was my first thought

 

An alignment? I'll confirm it but I'm pretty sure it wasn't long ago ...
I mean, we don't jump all over alignments anymore since we don't swap rims anymore, we swap tires. We bought separate rims for the tires so we can just throw them on as we wish ...

KM's? Haha, 254K I believe ...

Confirmed: We don't remember lol

 

Alignment has nothing to do with the wheels and tires. Its the camber, caster, and toe of the wheel.
Here is a site that explains it and shows pics. http://www.familycar.com/alignment.htm

Most of the time if the alignment is off it will show on the tires. Either the inside of say the right front is wearing bad on the outside, the inside of the left front will show wear. Most places have an alignment rack that does a four wheel alignment. They have sensor that attach to the wheels and tells a computer what angle the wheels sit at.

We had a truck at work the other day that was pulling to the left really hard, we put it up on the rack and the computer said everything was where it should be. We took the right front wheel and tire and put it on the left front and the left front to the right, no more pulling. It could just be the tires.

 

Guess we're going to for an alignment real soon ...
I'll have to post an update when I have one. Thanks for the tips!