Prius (2010-12) :: Steering Hard At Low Speeds - Bumping - Loose Feelings
Aug 11, 2012
I'm curious how many Gen 3 Prius II owners are having the same steering issue that I've been having. It's an occasional bumping/clunking or loose feeling when steering hard at low speeds. I've had the dealer look at it twice without their claiming to reproduce it. Part of the problem is finding the right words to describe it. It's more of a feeling in the steering wheel than a sound. Sometimes I feel it when turning into/out of a parking lot from/to the street. I'm not sure if it is just a normal characteristic of the electric power steering, or a defect in the power steering motor, coupling, or rack and pinion.
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I notice when I put the car in Power Mode and take off from a standing start, I get a distinctive bumping sensation in the drive train. It almost feels like the flywheel dampener is bottoming. This happens when, less than a moderate throttle input.
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I was driving my mother's 05 GX (non-kdss suspension).
The steering seems to be quite loose at speeds above 100kph (60mph).
There is also a vibration at these speeds (likely relating to balance).
How tight is your steering?
If alignment/balance doesn't fix things, what other parts might be the culprit?
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I test drove the sc 430 the other day, I found it very smooth and very soft ride. I noticed that when I accelerate the car feels heavy as if it lacks the torque. Is this normal?
Also, the steering felt loose at high speeds above 60mph. Is this normal?
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I bought a new 2010 (Gen III) Prius IV one week ago. I have driven it less than 200 miles. Last night, I experienced a few seconds of steering wheel shaking while driving at highways speeds. I assumed I had hit uneven pavement. At no point was it difficult to turn the wheel. But after the shaking, the car seemed to sometimes drift to one or the other edge of the lane. I chalked that up to unfamiliarity with the car and to rain and darkness. Today, I read Forum posts that described the lighter touch that usually works and the importance of wheel alignment.
After the shaking, another 45 minutes of driving, and a half hour parked, I headed home on a slower road. That is when my wife noticed that the Electric Power Steering warning light was on. We are both pretty sure it was off before that. This morning, I pulled out of the garage and back in, and turned the wheel both ways as it moved. The light did not come on.
I called the dealer to discuss what had occurred. I made a service appointment for Monday so they can check it out. Someone in a Gen II forum (where I mistakenly posted this at first) advised me to pull over and take an evidence photo of the light if it comes on again.
The PS warning light wouldn't be too surprising to see in a Prius driven tens of thousands of miles. If yours ever came on when your Prius had low mileage, I'd be curious to know the outcome. I misidentified a benign icon as the EPS warning light.
The mechanic became suspicious when he couldn't find any code or any trouble. We sketched the icon we remembered seeing for the service supervisor. He explained that it was the cruise control light. I either forgot I had turned cc on or I had pushed it accidentally when I operated the wipers.
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I noticed at 6000 miles our prius steering is hard to keep on center and seems to go L or R rather than straight. I run 38 psi but have tried 36 and didn't notice any diff. Tires are wearing good and dont think its alignment..
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2010 camry LE
A family member did a tune up on the car and did not realize that the power steering reservoir had a HOT and COLD min/max lines. He filled up to the max line for HOT while the car was completely cold. He also filled up with Prestone Power Steering fluid with Stop Leak instead of ATF/DEXIII.
The car was driven a few times for maybe 50 miles in total before I found out about all this and I drained the fluid out to the appropriate levels. However the steering at low/parking speeds is still very tight (tighter than what I used to remember, at least).
Did he royally screw up the power steering system here? What can I do?
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I recently had an accident which was absolutely scary. I was driving on a residential block and my steering became loose and started spinning. It was continuously spinning towards the right and my car scratched up a parked car until I finally was able to press the brakes and put it in park. After keeping it in park the steering wheel kept spinning out of control and didn't stop until the car was powered off.
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My 2010 6.4 F250 seems has a loose steering wheel. The steering of the truck hasn't changed nor has there been uneven wear on the tires. It doesn't drift if I let the steering wheel go. Had the front end inspected and was told it's all good under there.
YET, my actual steering wheel is loose. I can grab the wheel and wiggle it front to back and side to side. It FEELS like the bolts that hold the steering wheel to the column are loose. What was the cause/repair? Is this something I can repair myself or a local shop? Or is this a dealer fix?
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A few days ago I felt a feeling of bumping on a flat road when I turn slowly. I was wondering if it might be a transmission shift shock due to an insufficient warming at the cold temperature. It seemed such bumping didn't happen after enough warming more than 5 minutes.
The outside temp was just above 0 degree on yesterday morning, I started SF without warm-up and drove about 15 minutes. Then I was making 3 point turn on a residential road covered with a little bit of ice on its edge when I felt one of rear wheel was slipped a bit on the ice and rear wheel got locked or seized and skipped. Upon the complete turn I was able to drive the SF home slowly cautiously, however every time I made a slow sharp turn left or right there had been skipping leaving tire marks on the driveway.
I thought 4wd lock was initially activated at that time and it had not been deactivated since. I tried to push and release 4wd lock button several time with no success, and I felt the SF moving very heavier than usual. I was trying to park the vehicle backward with a sharp turn too, it was much harder to turn back than forward feeling like rear wheels were stuck somewhere, suddenly there was a loud banging or thumping sound from bottom behind. Right after the banging the SF was moving as normal.
Today I tested SF by driving above 60km/hr as well as sharp turning for 30 minutes, everything looked normal. A couple of hours later I decided to test 4wd lock button again. While I driving SF at about 10km/hr I pushed 4wd lock button and released it 15 seconds later. I did it a couple of times because I was not sure if 4wd lock was activated and deactivated. And I was making 3 point turn again, then the same rear wheel seizure and skidding happened. I stopped the SF and I pushed and released 4wd button a couple of times with no success.
Finally I tried to turn back as I did before, and there was a banging sound, I thought the sound was weaker than yesterday, since then everything went back to normal. There is no grinding or clunking noise from the area where the differential unit is located. I was wondering if mine has faulty electronic clutch itself or any other components. The warranty was over 5 months ago, mileage is only 49,000km.
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I have just over 11K miles on my 2011 and now notice steering wheel vibration & slight shake at 70 mph. The passenger can also feel it.
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2008 Touring model. When I encounter relatively small bumps, like, sealant over cracks on asphalt pavement, expansion joints, etc. there is a bumping noise from the front, seemingly the left, which I can feel through the steering wheel. The car handles and rides fine thus I am suspicious that it is a shock/strut issue, but I take note replacement is recommended at 60K miles. Mine has almost 120K.
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I've noticed that at speeds of 60+ (especially 65+), the Prius control doesn't seem "tight." I wouldn't go as far as saying it has a "shimmy" but it's harder to keep straight on the highway. I absolutely adore my Prius but this bothers me. I had the alignment checked and it's perfect. I know all small cars tend to be less grounded than, say, an SUV, but I'm still curious if this is normal before I take it into the dealer.
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Just wondering if it's possible to loosen one side of the bumper to remove the passenger side headlight ass'y?
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I've got a loose panel in the passenger footwell. It's the black plastic panel that your toes touch, if your passenger puts his heels on the floor and points his toes toward the sky. It has some kind of a white pad/filter on the top side.
The edge of the panel nearest the seat is firmly connected. The edge nearest the engine flopped down. I tried to put it back. There seems to be one plastic tab that sticks out and fits too-loosely into a rectangular hole on the front-of-car edge. As soon as my kid gets in the car again, his toes bump the plate and it flops down again.
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2013 Prius IV.... I just noticed that my right side rear bumper cover has a 1/4 inch gap between the bumper and the quarter panel. I think it's from me sitting on the bumper while tying up my shoes or something. When I apply downward pressure on the rear bumper, the gap widens. The left side is tighter, but does gap out when downward pressure is applied. In any case, the gap is annoying.
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My 2010 III, not 3 or Three since it is a 2010, will brake loose the tires when wet with moderate acceleration. If i floor it it will alternate spinning right to left until I back off the throttle. I"m not really complaining since I had an 08 that would not spin a tire and could not be driven in snow. Just wondering if this is normal on a 2010.
I turned right with moderate acceleration on wet pavement today and the tyres broke loose and the car was headed for the curb. Oh the traction control light does come on when this happens but, no brake application or engine speed reduction.
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I have a 2010 Prius, solar panels, sunroof, JBL, the works. (I bought it used.)
Whenever I go over a speed bump at an angle, or over rough terrain, there's a big clunk from somewhere above and behind me. But I could never tell exactly where it's coming from. t First I thought it might be something loose in the sunroof, but I don't think so. I made my wife sit in the backseat while I drove over nearby speed bumps, and she kept pointing toward the area of the roof that houses the solar panels. Can they come loose? Or can the roof struts come loose?
Anyway, that leads to -- my mechanic is trying to figure out how much it would cost to get in there and take a look. He seemed to think that removing the headliner means buying a new headliner (i.e. removing it wrecks it.) That gets very expensive.
The clunk is very annoying, sounds like the car is coming apart. Maybe it is!
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I'm sure that this is not normal, but I just want to know if any one else has this problem with their car. When the windows are down, they are loose in their tracks -- you can actually shift them forward and backward with your fingers. Also, if the windows are lowered when I shut the door, the windows flutter. The right rear window is so loose, that it creaks when I hit a bump even when the window is all the way up. The windows seal up just fine -- no wind noise or leaks of any sort.
In the link below you can see me shifting the windows forward and back. The right front window is least affected, right rear is the worst, and the two left windows seem about the same.
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I changed the battery in my key fob recently. Since then the car has randomly given me "key not detected" signals. At these times, the door lock/unlock buttons don't work either.
When it does, I open it and push the battery around, trying to make it connect, close the fob back up, and it works for some apparently random amount of time. So my best guess it that there's a loose connection to the battery.
If so, have you found a cure, such as the right place to wedge in something small to make the connection secure? Anything else?
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Saturday, I parked the car and tried to lock the doors with the fob. The car held a constant beep but would not lock the doors. They locked fine from the driver's door.
Later as I was going over a speed bump, the car bleeped, the cabin light came on and off, and the display showed 'key found' in a period of 10 seconds. This speed bump anomaly happened twice later that day. Dark, I want to wait until dawn before getting serious into the debug.
My first thought is a loose ground wire or 12V connector. The last work was the brake accumulator recall. If the technician did not torque down the ground connector, there would be high resistance leading to the key fob lock problem as well as the speed bump triggered reset.
I also have a miniVCI so before doing any work, I'll use it to look for error codes. There are more than one connector that could be loose and having the codes could give us a clue if it happens again.
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