Vibration in gear when stopped, that goes away in Park or Neutral

Folks,

Our 107,000 mile '04 Tundra AC 2WD has recently developed a slight vibration. It's noticeable in gear when stopped, but goes away in Neutral or Park. I can feel it in the steering wheel. I confess to there being a slight vibration at speed, as well. The vibration seems to have started when the winter temps set in. There is no clunking sound when shifting into or out of gear, or when accelerating or braking.

I did a timing belt/water pump/serpentine belt/radiator job on her in March. She runs well. I replaced all the steering rack and front sway bushings a year ago. I have been using the Tundra to tow my car to the track for the last couple of years, but it's not a daily driver. Hence the low miles.

A search here for "vibration that goes away in park" yielded a bunch of older threads about trucks that have vibrated since new, threads about the transmission bracket TSB, and about the driveshaft carrier bearing going bad, but I didn't find anything else about a slight vibration arising after 20 years. I did read through a bunch of threads, especially about the carrier bearing.

The carrier bearing looks good. The rubber is intact. I could easily read the part number. There's no leakage at the bearing. It does seem to have sagged about as much as it could, but I can't move it around much, although it was about 40 degrees outside. All the U-joints are tight. I didn't find any missing or obviously loose bolts, but I made no attempt at tightening anything. I need a second person to sit in the truck with it running and in Drive whilst I poke around.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks much,

poormxdad

 

Easiest inspection would be engine, transmission mounts. What shape are they in... After 30 years my SC has been through 3 sets of both. You can probably open the hood and accelerate the engine in Neutral or Park and see if the engine is shifting in the bay, can be an indication. Other than that not sure about anything else.

 

Just confirming: The vibration isn't happening as noticeably or badly when rolling, primarily only when you're (1) in a Drive gear and (2) fully stopped using brakes / idling while not in Park / Neutral?

I ask for a reason. It's more than likely not something in the driveline (u-joints, carrier bearing) if the issue isn't happening while the driveshaft isn't rotating. That's not to say it couldn't be transmission related.

More often than not, if a vibration primarily only happens at idle, it was either because I've got a air/fuel/idle issue (cracked/degrading/loose vacuum hose, intake gasket leak, dirty-as-hell throttle body), or potentially because a mount has gone bad. The TSB for 2WD mounts I believe only impacts 05/06 Tundra and 05-07 Sequoia, so I'm wondering about other things.

You're not one of those misguided souls who did something silly, like install a K&N intake kit, or is using an oiled filter, are you? The 2UZ-FE seems to suffer pretty badly from dirt in the intake from either and has been shown to lose power with those kits. If you installed one, say, 10k-30k miles ago, the amount of accumulation you've probably built up in the throttle body as a result could explain the slow, gradual prominence of the symptom.

 

Correct. The vibration goes away when stopped if the trans is placed in Neutral or Park.

Stock air cleaner box with Wix filter. I haven't cleaned the throttle body in a while.

 

It's an interesting set of symptoms. Any check engine light lit, or codes pending/stored?

If not, I guess I'd be checking vacuum hoses, unplug each, check for split ends, replug. Then check all of my mounts (motor/trans), and the bolts to make sure they're more than finger tight.

Sadly, no safe way to keep it in gear and stopped shy of getting a friend you really, really trust. Maybe do the vacuum hoses while they're on it.

 

Check the transmission fluid level, and open the inspection plate in the bell housing and inspect for cracks on the flex plate.

 

2WD, definitely check the mounts, they have a tendency to both crack, and lose bolts. Next for me would be trans fluid level check. Your 2004 will have the 4 speed with a dipstick under the hood to check levels. It's the one closest to the firewall. Warm it up, shift slowly through all the gears and then check the level with the engine running. Next up would be a torque converter (rare for these) or flex plate (more common but still rare) issue.

 

Also inspect the coils for cracks in the housing. Could be an ever so slight misfire.

 

Agree with possible vacuum leak.

 

I'd check your throttle body, and clean it, even if it's not that dirty. After that I'd do an ECU reset (disconnect battery for 20 minutes), and then drive it 20 or 30 miles.

I had a lot of similar symptoms on my truck, and sure enough the throttle body was disgusting. Same story, it would kinda vibrate at idle in gear, and especially when the headlights were on, which I guess pulled the idle down just enough to make a difference. After a good cleaning it idled super strong and so so smooth.

 

what's crazy is i'm having the SAME EXACT SYMPTOMS on 2004 matrix. already cleaned the throttle body. mounts good. now i gotta figure out how to test for a vacuum leak

 

Smoke test.

 

I currently have the same problem with my 06 double cab. Had the dealer check all the mounts and everything looked good. Next step is to clean the throttle body and check coils and vacuum lines.

 

Alrighty then... the trans fluid checked good. I found a handful of motor mount bolts that I could swing a few degrees with a long-handle ratchet, but none were actually loose. The coils look fine. ScanGaugeII shows no codes. I checked for vacuum leaks with starting fluid and found none. I cleaned the TB and MAF, and did the TB calibration. I added a bottle of Techron. No real change to the vibration. I'm hesitant to do the ECU reset since I believe I'll need to redo the radio and phone pairing, but other than that, I'm out of ideas.

What next?

Thanks much,

 

It's a pretty big significant mistake to clean the TB but not reset the ECU.

Take your negative battery cable off for 10 minutes. Expect the engine may run a little awkward for the first 10mins or so after. I can't stress how important this step is with EFI engines after doing something significant like cleaning the TB.

Deal with the radio stuff, it's not that hard to reset a clock and/or pair a phone. Bluetooth pairing on most modern devices is typically stored in NVRAM or similar persistent memory. That should be a much lesser concern than getting your vehicle running smoothly.

 

I'm really hanging up on this post right here. OP you could have a misfire that just hasn't decided to throw a code. Sometimes misfire codes just don't like to set for whatever reason. Your coils may look just fine so I would say that just because they have no cracks doesn't necessarily mean they are all good. If nothing else you're doing is getting you anywhere and nothing looks damaged I'd consider continuing to let it "vibrate" and see if it will throw a code eventually. Sometimes it takes quite a while.

Do you know that the coils in there are original OEM?

 

We bought the truck used several years ago, with about 52,000 miles on it. I assume the coils are original. I did replace the plugs a while back, but reused the coils.

 

Just making sure it didn't have junky parts store coils on it. Still doesn't mean you don't have a bad coil but until it throws a code for it you'll never know which one if that is the problem. Quite an expensive option to just throw new coils on it. That's also pretty low mileage to have a coil go out but it isn't impossible.

You could check and make sure that all the coils say Toyota/Denso on them just to verify brand.
Pic shows just denso but yours will say Toyota above that if original.

 

Where did you get the plugs and what kind are they?

 

I've been mechanicking most of my life. I track a supercharged Miata, and my backup track car is a 2007 Audi S4. I do all my own work. I have never heard that before. Is it Toyota specific?

 

I'm not sure if it's Toyota specific but from my experience, and many others on here, it's a really essential step of the throttle body cleaning process. It seems to me like the ECU won't re-learn if you don't reset it by disconnecting the battery. I didn't experience any positive results until I did the reset and re-learn process.

Another thing that could be causing your vibration issues is a cracked or sorta failing coil. I've had situations where a coil works fine but every once in a while it'll miss. For some reason these trucks seem very hesitant to throw a misfire code, even when it's very obvious. When I had a coil go bad I had to do full throttle, uphill pulls to get it to throw a code. A bad coil seems less likely to me as I trust that you'd be able to identify a misfire-like vibration, but it might be worth looking into.

As others have mentioned, ensure that your coils are Denso brand. Seriously. They are the only ones that will last reliably. Also make sure the tubes on the coils don't have cracks like this:


Hoping you figure out what it might be soon. Having an issue without a known cause really sucks.

 

What those guys said ^^

For what it's worth, I've also been wrenching my whole life, probably 4 decades under my belt. I typically have a habit of disco'ing the neg batt cable any time I do anything that would impact fuel/air delivery, I learned the hard way one time and now I don't take any chances. Virtually all modern EFI engines follow some form of readiness, and ECU will slowly learn/store/adapt over time. We've seen that point bite people in the ass here a few times, especially in cases where the TB was significantly dirty, which seems to happen pretty often with the bullshit aftermarket oiled filters and/or intakes.

If your TB wasn't that dirty, it's probably pointless, the ECU will just adapt. But I feel like you're doing your wallet a disservice, because your a/f mixture will probably be off for a longer period of time than you'd experience by forcing a re-learn.

It is what it is. And the guys above speaking to the coil pack cracking, and NOT using aftermarket brands (even MSD, which I happen to love for some of my older rod projects), and being really careful where you purchase, since there are a lot of authentic-looking knockoffs that make their way thru scAmazon and fleaBay. Not saying that's what it is, but I would take a minute to inspect the coils.

While in there, if you have no known history on the plugs, I'd check them, see if some look worse, you may identify a cylinder that's seeing lower-than-CEL-level-misfires. Also, check to make sure they used the right f'n plugs, since we've seen some folks who got fakes on fleaBay or scAmazon, and they had chunks missing, one guy here actually lost a piece of plug into his cylinder from a fake. Or hell, if you're in there anyway, why not just refresh all the plugs with new NGK or Denso from a legit vendor?

 

I would check the universal joints as they tend to wear out with time and can cause vibration. I had the same symptoms on a Nissan Titan and the issue was the u-joints. Cups ran out of grease and the rusty warn out bearings would vibrate when the truck was in gear.
Good luck with truck

 

All my COPs are marked Toyota/Denso. I did replace the plugs a while back. I would have used what was recommended, but I can't find where I wrote down the what and when. However, I'm pretty sure I didn't splurge on iridiums.

I disconnected the battery for 30 minutes. No change to the vibration, and I can't perceive any difference to the way it drives.

 

I inspected all the COPs and plugs. I had, in fact, purchased the iridiums, NGK BKR6EIX. All the COPs and plugs look great.

 

If it only happens in idle conditions (park, neutral, stopped by brake) but no other time, and there's no check engine, no codes set, nothing showing up on an OBDII tool that looks suspicious, and you're positive the coils, the plugs are fine, and certain there's no vacuum leaks, I'm at a loss. The only thing that sticks up at the top of the pile for me at that point is "too low idle" or "bad mount".

Tell me this:

Do you see the RPMs drop as the shake is happening? Or do they stay consistent?

Where is it idling, exactly, how many RPM?

Does the shaking get better or worse when the air conditioner is on at full blast?

Have you done anything, like test pinching the power steering air control valves, to see if the idle kicks up/down? Or disconnecting and reconnecting any vacuum lines to see if it gets better?

At this point, I'm tempted to tell you to change the fuel filter, even though it's almost never the fuel filter.

 

I've been hunting a similar issue for a long time. I'm convinced it's in the tranny, maybe the flex plate ot torque converter. I can duplicate it standing still in gear, but it goes away in park or neutral. Of course that mat be because the rpm goes up a tad when out of gear.

 

GX, mine is a teeny, tiny little constant vibration when in gear that I feel in the steering wheel that was not there before. It might be better described as a buzz. Yours?

 

Not to diminish, but I have something similar on my '06 with 76,667 miles on it. Once I noticed it, I can't "un-notice" it. It drives me a little nuts.

 

Yup. Bought the truck used and it didn’t do it. After I had a drain & fill done on the trans fluid, it started.