I posted a question about vibration in the driveshaft a couple of weeks ago (March 24). Ringlee responded with a copy of the TSB about this problem. Since then a couple of others have posted questions about similar symptoms.

The TSB indicates that shaft alignment is sensitive to prevent the shudder under heavy load and on standing start. It recommends shimming the driveline support via a trial and error procedure to change the height of the support until the shudder goes away. The TSB recommends moving the support up about a quarter inch, and if that doesn't fix it then to move it down as much as half an inch until the problem is corrected.

I shimmed it up a quarter inch and the problem was much worse. Then I move it down from its original position a distance equivalent to the thickness of one flat washer, and the shudder was almost gone (I didn't have any more washers). I think that if I add one more washer to the shims then it will cure it completely. I'll try that later today when I get under the car to change the oil.

My question is: Why did this problem suddenly manifest itself? It hasn't had a driveline shudder for over a hundred thousand miles, and now it has developed a problem at 120k miles. Is this an indication that my springs and/or shocks are weakening or sagging? Or is there some other reason that the alignment of the shaft would gradually change over the years and miles?

I'm just wondering if there's another problem I need to address that I don't know about. Any thoughts or comments?

Robert