I bought my cooper sd a few months back with loads of problems and I’m down to the last few. The main one which has me fairy stumped is a very aggressive vibration throughout the whole car. 

\- low speeds ( 1-3 mph)

\- more obvious when the steering wheel is locked

\- more obvious when on a hill 

\- worse in reverse

I have noticed that when it’s doing it, it’s the front wheels themselves shaking, maybe this is what’s translating though the whole car or maybe something else is causing it and also passing it through to the wheels. 

What I’ve replaced so far which it can’t be:

\-All engine & gearbox mounts

\-both drive shafts 

\-clutch 

\-flywheel (used: 10,000 miles) ( could this be an issue?)

\-inner and outer tie rods

My current guess is the control arm rear bushes and that these are allowing the wheels to shake and shudder, the only reason I’m not 100% sure is I’ve tried to apply some force to them and they do move laterally maybe 5-10mm, but Im unsure if that movement is within tolerance. 

Around 50mph the steering wheel also shakes to an extent and it’s worse when turning or braking. I know these are common signs of bad control arms but I’ve never seen any mention of wheel shudder at low speeds, at least not on any forums I’ve looked on.

I’ve have heard though that a shuddering like this could be more prominent on a diesel due to the torque pulses and this would also make sense with it being worse in reverse. 

Also flywheel wise, there’s no other signs it’s bad, more revs helps which might not be the case if the flywheel is bad, there’s no shudder when I start or turn off the car, there is also no vibrations though the gearstick. 

I’m going to replace the control arms this weekend, if any genius mechanic can think of another potential cause to all of this it would be greatly appreciated. 

Also sorry if I’ve gotten anything wrong, this post was a bit rushed as my break is about to end 😕. 

TIA for any reply’s. 

R56 Cooper SD low speed vibrations - can’t find anything similar online.