[Vwdiesel] Shake at a speed + side slide

[Doug Presny]

Now that my 82 Rabbit car is back on the road (many thanks to all), I am
trying to smooth out the ride.  The first problem is that the rear of
the car has a shake which starts at 51 mph and goes away at 55 mph.  The
alignment folks tell me that these types of things are always problems
with the wheel/rim balance.  The new tires I have were balanced and the
one rim that was bad was replaced.  Are there any other potential causes
folks can think of?  

 

The second problem is a drift of the whole car that I experience at
higher speeds when I hit a series of bumps.  The car will quickly drift
both to the right or the left which is quite unnerving.  I just replaced
the front struts.  The problem existed before the front struts were
replaced.  I am assuming this problem may be alignment.  Before I have
the car aligned, I wanted to take care of any other problems that might
be contributing.