Can a brake rotor be out of balance?

Trying to diagnose a steering wheel shimmy with a 95 Integra. Of course, no local repair shop can be bothered, so Im stuck doing it myself.

Can a rotor be out of balance, like a tire?

The car was FINE, until local shop pulled the wheels to do a tuneup/inspection as part of normal service. Now Ive got this shimmy at 65MPH and up.

Balance is fine. And was checked with a Hunter 9700 Road Force
Variance machine. CV Joints were rebuilt recently. They were fine, too. All bushings in good shape...so is the alignment. Tire inflation checks out.

So....Im wondering if it could be the rotors. Can a rotor be out of balance, like a tire? They are warped pretty good, but again, until the wheels were pulled off the car last week, all was well. Also, could something be loose up in there in the rotor assembly or "stuck" like a caliper bolt thats screwing with things?

At the end of the rope......

Maybe not. Warped rotors can cause all this by themselves. Get new rotors. Don't let anyone near your lug nuts with an impact gun.
Improper torque is probably what caused your troubles in the first place.

Yes. due to warpage. But it would cause a plusing feel to the brakes. Older cars, probably only with drums though had balance weights welded on, and if these fell off it would create a pulsing feel.

Hmm.... could be that the rotors were warped by over torquing the lugs with an impact wrench.

Cept while braking. With a front drum I was puting the wheel back on and sliped puting the wheel on and it knocked a balance weight off the drum. Car drove fine until I started braking and then the vibrations, in both the pedal and wheel began. I replaced the drum and the problem went away. The problem wasn't there before knocking the balance weight off.

I sort of had the same problem as you, Drove me nuts. Had my wheels balanced, Checked the rotors.Landed up buying new tires no more shimmy. bob

Occasionally you see a replacment rotor that is imbalanced from the factory, usually due to core shift making the casting thicker on one side. It is very rare for one of these to make it out of the factory.
As for OE rotors becoming imbalanced while in service, can't happen unless it picks up foreighn material somehow - Mud or dirt-dobber nest in the vanes, or a bolt jammed in there. Rotors are inherently balanced.
The above is true for vented rotors only, which your Integra should have.
Rex in Fort Worth

If it ONLY does it to an extreme while braking, try the same slowing down, not instantly

Check the wheel lug nuts!
86/00 CJ7 Laredo, 33x9.5 BFG Muds, 'glass nose to tail in '00
88 Cherokee 235 BFG AT's

Not enough to ever be noticeable. The radius at which the mass acts is too small to generate significant out of balance forces.

Try swapping the tyres from side to side. Otherwise it sounds like a wheel balance, bent rim, faulty tyre carcass or wheel bearing problem.

Dave Baker - Puma Race Engines (www.pumaracing.co.uk)
I'm not at all sure why women like men. We're argumentative, childish, unsociable and extremely unappealing naked. I'm quite grateful they do though.

The symptoms sound the same as a worn front shock - have you checked? Jack the front of the car up and run your finger all round the shock and see if there is any oil leak.

Don't know if they can be out of balance (doubt it, ..at least not enough to make a difference), but I changed just the pads on my Chrysler hoping I could get away with the existing rotor which did not look that bad. Wrong.
I had a wheel shimmy at 55 .
Put new rotors on it and the problem went away. Further closer inspection of the backside of the old rotor did reveal pitting and overall condition that probably justified it's replacement.

Sure sounds like a cracked rotor to me.
Look them over carefully again, especially the inside.
When the pads hit that crack, you can feel it and hear it.

Rex in Fort Worth

Just took the car out and went up to 80 MPH and applied the brakes.
Steering wheel shakes VIOLENTLY AND I get knocking noise out of front end in synch with the shaking.

Worse, I got the same noise coming off the highway on the ramp at about 40 MHP, while on the brakes and bleeding speed.