Steering wheel shakes and car pulls to side
Asked by Bblondie141 Jul 08, 2015 at 01:19 PM about the 2007 Chevrolet Cobalt LS Sedan FWD
Question type: General
My steering wheel vibrates at all speeds
(worse at higher speeds) and my car pulls
slightly to the left side. I was told it was my
tires so I went and had all 4 tires replaced,
balanced, and aligned recently. That helped
a little, but it still vibrates while I'm driving at
all speeds. When I brake hard, the vibration
increases dramatically.
Also, if I'm at a complete stop or just a slow
speed and decide to floorboard it, my rpm's
will go up for a split second and then my car
completely falls on its face. No rpm's at all,
with the gas pedal completely down. This
occurs for 5-10 seconds before they actually
pick back up.
Any clue what either of the problems would
be? Thanks!
5 Answers
did you get a wheel alignment, did you have the front and rear bearing checked? brakes and rotors are they OK? Rotors could be out of round?
Vibration most likely brake rotor. Probably have stuck caliper pin that caused brake pad to heat up and warp rotor.
Sorry guys. Nothing to do with brakes or alignment or bearings. That's a classic case of a failing CV shaft, (front axle). The bearing may well be failing as well, they often go at about the same time but that does not cause the kind of vibration being described here. If its in the budget, replace both axles and both front bearings. If its not in the budget do whichever side seems to be the worst and do the other side as soon as you can afford it. If money is really tight replace just the axle shafts one at a time, but you may be left with some minor vibration from the bearings. The good news is that bearings, and even axles sound and feel much worse than they really are. If you can tolerate the vibration and realize that you're not doing your car any good by driving it that way you can drive it that way for a long time. Sorry to hear about the money you spent on tires. I hope your old ones were at least needing replacement anyway. I nearly did the same thing when a shop had an inexperienced apprentice diagnose my axle problem as tires. I way on the way to buy the new tires when I thought it through again and realized that the symptoms were not right for tires.
My car is doing the exact same thing. Did you ever figure out what it was?
If its doing the exact same thing then its most likely a failing CV joint in one or both front axle shafts.
