Right driveshaft
My surfmobile 2009 Fit sport has developed a bit of a vibration and low frequency (as in bass frequency) noise around 65mph, feel it in the floor and the steering wheel. Tire pressure is fine, everything else seems normal. Tires are serviceable but well used. Probably going to have the wheels balanced first, then I guess check brakes to see if there rotors are warped or there's a drum issue in the back, but it doesn't seem like a brake issue since braking or not braking changes nothing, unless a warm . I stuck my phone under the car and took a video, so this is a screengrab from that video. Way easier than trying to get the shot without seeing the screen, just not as sharp.

But also I'm hoping the driveshafts aren't going to explode. It has like 120k on it and I'm in NJ, so, definitely lots of salt and such. I saw some pictures in other threads and this seems not good. Both of them are like this. I know of the recall, but the dealers didn't have the parts forever and, well, I need the car running each day, unless they're going to give me a loaner.

Side note: the fit is the best surfmobile. With the seats down I put two universal weathertech mats in the back and use it as a small pickup truck. That fits my smaller boards, 5'2", 5'3", 5'8", 6'4". If I lean the passenger seat down over that I can fit my 8' longboard. If I only fold the passenger rear seat and fully recline the front seat we can stow boards front to back, including the 8' board, and carry a passenger. With all the seats in the back down and only shortboards I can carry a passenger up front. And I get like 41mpg in the summer on the highway according to the dash meter. Slightly less in the winter. Best part is in the summer I get great parking spots because nobody's giant pickup trucks can fit, but I can. The vehicle is aptly named.

 

Glad to hear you like the car! Lately I've found my hobbies to require an actual pickup for transporting lumber and tools.. But I so hate trucks. The turn radius, the idea of performance being an increase of ground clearance and off-road capability rather than general handling. And I've been spoiled by the unique engine mounts in the fit that hang the engine by insulators rather than propping it up. 😅Lack of budget friendly road performance oriented platforms is a pain too. And I fully agree with you in appreciating the minimized width v. big for nothin'. 8 cupholders!!!

Alright, dialing back the weirdness.

Your cv axel looks like the rust is just on the surface, but those insulators on the automatic transmission variants seem to hide a rather large problem. It was a nice thought on their part, just lacked foresight.
I would recommend discussing reimbursement and then seeking to replace them as soon as possible. Aftermarket shafts/axels are a fine solution from what I've heard. Although I suspect the greatest amount of strain on the shaft would take place when changing from first to second gear in an automatic, shaft failure can be (for obvious reasons) very dangerous.

Edit: It would be good practice to wash the underside of the car as soon as possible after driving on salted roads. Doing so would help reduce oxidation. A lawn sprinkler could be of use for this purpose.

 

I thought I was the only one crawling around with a sprinkler during winter. I've been rinsing the underside of my '09 whenever it gets above freezing during winter, and it looks really good for a car that's had 12 Ohio rust-belt winters. I use a sprinkler on the end of a 2x4 and just slide it around underneath the car.

 

Wow this is so simple but genius.

I live really close to a dealer and just made an appointment. Apparently they're fine, just surface rust.

 

I got the idea from the internet, actually. I thought it was one of those things that everyone did but I was somehow unaware of until recently. The idea of washing off the undercarriage of a car just after use kinda puts me off, because you're shocking exhaust components thermally.. but then, the potential negatives of thermal shock would (I suspect) be the loosening of fasteners and potentially making metal more brittle over time. Compared to rust it still strikes me as the lesser of two evils. Both damage components, but thermal shock should make them easier to disassemble and replace when needed, while rust fuses things together.

I just recently had to replace a whole exhaust system minus the header on our truck. The catalytic converters were failing, but I couldn't remove them because the fasteners were so thoroughly fused. I first tried a welder, but the dude did a truly terrible job and left areas unwelded, leaking audibly even when the truck was at operating temp, so i resolved to forego welding in the future and instead keep the parts serviceable.

Do you know what was causing your vibration yet? If it was primarily coming through the steering wheel at high speed it should be a matter of wheel balance.

 

I would think that the problem is wheel balancing. When you feel it in the steering wheel, it's one or more of the front wheels. If you feel it in your ass, the rear wheel(s). If you get a vibration in the break peddle, it's in the rotors/drums.

 

So I ended up getting new tires because I needed them anyway. Was more or less even with the wear bars. Apparently there's a tire shortage cause these were hard to find? Used to have Michelin Defenders, now I have Hankook Ventus V2 or whatever they're called, my local Costco can't seem to get the Michelins. Anyway I can't exactly conclude if it was an alignment issue, wheel balancing issue or a tire that was about to catastrophically fail since all of that was taken care of when getting new tires. But I guess we can chalk it up to one of those three. My shake was not exactly reproducible in that it was happening consistently, of course, when I drove it, except for the morning I drove it to be looked at. But it was in and out at other times too prior to that. I assume if I wheel was off balance it'd shake any time I hit whatever specific rpm causes it to oscillate badly.

New brakes are in the cards soon anyway. There's a bit of a vibration in the pedal, and I think this is the drums because last time I had break service the first place I took it to did a shit job, and vibrations started soon after. Took it to a better place and they're like who did this? Needed a simple adjustment and it was fine. I might actually need new wear parts this time though, since they're quite used by now.

 

Happy to hear that things are getting better. This has been one of my favorite cars that I've owned. I hope that you find many years of reliable service with yours.