Good for you! Yeah the vibration was mostly through the steering wheel and threw off everyone at the club that test drove the car while trying to help diagnose! Bearing was the most common suggestion... but wrong. I know how frustrating it is not to know what wrong and sympathize!

I had a similar problem a couple of months ago, driving in France. As soon as the speed picked up to around 75-80mph the steering wheel was visibly shaking. It disappeared after a 3 hour drive.

I think my problem was linked to the fact that the car is sitting around on the same contact patch on the tyre for days at a time and it had slightly deformed the tyre.

I think the long fast drive heated the tyre nicely and centrifugal force help to re-round it.

When you say you wound up with a set of BBS wheels that sounds like you did not buy them new. That makes me think it may be the front wheel may be bent. Also you can always get a shimmy from the steering wheel if you put enough air PSI in the front tires. Always spinup wheels on a tire balancer to see how out of balance they are before mounting a tire on them.

BBS wheels were purchased new, and they have been spun on a Hunter DSP and are about as true as wheels get. The problem was solved by using the Road Force balancer to re-mount the tires (all 4) to get the lowest road force. All are under 10 pounds now and things are perfect.

Patrick