Steering Wheel Vibrates When Speeding
June 6, 2007 by Admin
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When you drive at certain speeds over 40 km/hour, you feel that the steering wheel suddenly begin to vibrate. This is even when your tires are still in good condition and free of bulges and damaged threads. Sometimes you’ll feel slight vibration but other times you could hear thundering sound which only stops when you slow down your car.
When you drive at high speed, you must know that the balance of each wheel and tires are very important. Wheels will begin to vibrate if they are out of balance. The vibration is transmitted to the steering linkage and the suspension that holds the wheels to the car. If wheel-balance vibration is left unrepaired, the life span of the front and rear suspension will reduce. Apart from that, a wheel-balance vibration also causes premature tire wear, tire failure and damage tire tread.
There are 3 basic ways to diagnose and to solve this problem.
1. As you drive at highway speed and you feel the steering wheel vibrate in your hand, it often means that one wheel and tire combination is out of balance. Basically this means that there is a spot on one part of the tire that is heavier than a similar spot on the other side of the tire. The heavier spot tends to cause vibration as the speed increases. This condition also known as a wheel-balance vibration. you can ask your mechanic or any tire service centre to balance the wheel and this usually solves the problem. It’s a good practice to have every new tire balanced. Whenever vibration occurs, make sure to have all 4 wheels balanced.
2. When the tire is not truly round or when there’s a slight bulge (almost undetected) in the tire, a vibration similar to a wheel-balance problem can occur. Low thump at low speed generally occur at this condition. You might feel the car move up and down as the wheel turns. The only way to solve this problem is to replace the tire. The tire which is not truly round can be easily detected by a mechanic on a wheel-balancing machine where the exact shape of the tire could be seen as the tire turn slowly.
3. If you drive into a pothole, the wheel might be bent from its original shape from the collision. This could cause the wheel and tire to vibrate. Wheel balancing will not be able to solve this problem. The bent could be easily detected from the wheel-balancing machine. If the bent is not that serious, the mechanic might be able to knock and reshape the wheel back to its original condition. Otherwise, if the bent is too bad, you’ll need to replace the wheel with a new one.
Great tip and info. It is really important to know some basic stuffs on how car parts really works, so that one will have an idea if there is something wrong or if its time for a replacement. This is to ensure that each auto parts like steering wheel, mazda wheels are in good condition. This will also keep us safe when driving.
I HAVE OPEL Vectra and i have problem with when i stop car the whole car vibrate 2 or 3 times and then rpm is ok at that time rpm niddle goes up and down can you please inform what can be the problem.
Thank and Regards