New dodge caravan around 12,000 miles steering wheel shakes at 55 to 65 mph balanced tires didn't fix problem, mechanic says wheel bearing may be bad?

 

well, you still have waranty, right?
How bad does it shake? Slight shimmy or rock you boat type of shake? for some reason, all the Caravan have slight shimmy feeling around 60MPH at steering wheel, don't believe me? try driving another one.
I've fixed some Caravan by replacing the Center drive axle shaft with "rock my boat" vibration.

 

what u mean by rock the boat? mine vibratad since new too but i yet to even bother me to point i going to complain about it.

 

Like you clip on 5 oz of weight on your front wheel. But like I've said, it seems that most Caravan suffers from a minor steering wheel shake at around 60mph for some reason. Maybe u will just have to avoid that speed...

 

Try rotating tires front to back and see if the vibration goes away from the steering wheel. If it does then might be a bad tire. I have a 12 with only 2500km on it and have not noticed any vibration.

 

Had tires balanced rotated tires per owners manual still shakes at 55 -65 didn't do this prior to 12,000 miles, local chrysler dealer wants to replace wheel bearing doesn't sound right to me ? anyone have similar experience? I'm thinking front end alignment but the vehicle tracks straight down the road

 

not wheel alignment. nothing to do with this. either bad wheel tire. not balanced right. i forget term but theres a better way to balance tires than the regular way but more expensive. if i recall i post.

 

I have the same issue with my 2012 DGC and it has been there since new. Vibration and shimmy from 55 and up, much worse during the 1st few miles of driving but never gone.

at 2600 miles the dealer rebalanced and no change. They also replaced the front rotors and brake pads due to warping and that made no change either

I took it to a shop with a hunter gsp9700 and paid $85 for the roadforce balance. All were within spec 4-16lbs of roadforce.

Still the shimmy is there.

I have the Kumho Solus SH25 on mine which I think may be the problem.

 

I also have kumko sumso tires with unnormal wear for 16000 miles according to a mechanic I trust I think tires are the problem I've balanced an rotated with same problem

 

I am bringing it back to the dealer this week.

They just got a Hunter road force balancer and they are going to try and balance again.

This is the 3rd brand new car (2011 Ford Mustang GT and 2011 Honda Accord) in a row that I have had a vibration issue with. The other two were never fixed even after buying new wheels and tires. I am about to give up on new cars altogether.