my steering wheel on my car has started to wobble from side to side while driving in a straight line. why?

Answer 1

Wheel balancing,
Wheel alignment,
Uneven tyre tread,
Worn CV joint,
Uneven tyre pressure,
Buckled wheel,
Loose wheel nut(s),
Excessive vibration from worn wheel bearings of stearing bushes.

Answer 2

There could be a number of reasons from the simple like tire pressure to the very expensive like a frame problem. The best guess is that you hit a pot hole or curb and the car is out of allignment. This much is certain you need to get it checked and fixed pronto. The wobbleis at the least affecting the tires and making a blowout and/or tire repkacement more likely. Besides the expense of tire replacement a blow out especially with a wobbly car could cause a serious accident. Wobblle problems also indicate a difficulty in controling the "track" or steering which is dangerous in a hard stop, can make a near skid a bad skid throwing you into oncomming traffic and make it much harder to control in any emergency maneuver. All wobble type problems get worse not better if uncorrected so the sooner the better.Start by checking air pressure i9n tires even if the tires look about the same. A friend probably has an air gage and if not you can buy one for $2 or less. Many convenience stores sell them and all autoparts places do. Many convenience stores also have a 50 cent air machine that lets you put air into tire but if you do not know what you are doing with this get someone to show youn the first time or go by a service station because if you mess up you can break valve stem and/or let all the air out of tire which makes alittleprobl;em a really big problem. If it is air pressure keep check on that tire and see if it gets low again.if it does you have a slow leak and it needs to be fixed. If it is not tire pressure please go have this checked as soon as possible, And stay absolutely sober when driving this thing till it is fixed because it is a DUI stop waiting to happen. You know it's the car but to an officer it will appear to be your drving.

Answer 3

If you are sure the spare is on tightly, it is unlikely to be balancing, unless there is a seriously big imbalance somewhere. As you say, it is very difficult to diagnose without seeing it, so why not take the old tyre into a tyre bay to see if they can repair the puncture, and they can check out the spare at the same time. (As a rule of thumb, if the puncture is within the central part of the tread, and not at a mad angle, it may well be repairable. Punctures near the shoulder and/or at an angle are less likely to be repairable.) You didn't say how the tyre got punctured, but you imply that it happened when you hit something. If this is the case then don't drive the car if you can avoid it and take it to a garage ASAP! It could be all sorts of things, some of them expensive. Good luck, I hope this doesn't cost you a bomb!

Answer 4

Your steering column is loose. It's a super simple fix u just gotta tighten a nut or bolt or two my car used to do it all the time. Get it handled soon though because I'm not kidding when I say ur steering wheel could fall off if it gets too loose. If it was an alignment problem ur actualy car would be going in different directions.

Answer 5

A tyre problem, most likely. Have you had a good look at the tyres? There might be an 'egg' in onw of them, or maybe just the balancing weight has fallen off. If they look ok and the pressures are right, take it to a garage and have the front wheels balanced. About 4-5 quid each.

Answer 6

Likelihood:
Front tyres need re-balancing / wheels nuts come loose - 80%
Track rod end gone bad - 10%
Steering rack / box gone bad - 5%
Other Suspension problem - 5%
Wheel alignment problem - 0%

Answer 7

sounds like your wheels need balancing. any local tyre place will do this for you. basically its a bit like having a buckled wheel on a bike, thats why it feels wobbly. its fixed by sticking weights to exact spots on the wheels to couneract the wobble. good luck

Answer 8

If you've changed tyres, they've not balanced them properly. Get them to spin the things up to a good high speed and balance them properly this time.

Failing that you're steering wheel is about to fall off!

Answer 9

That sounds like you need an alignment. Take it in to your nearest tire store and have them check it out. If there are problems with the tires they'll let you know, but that wobble is almost always an alignment problem. It'll cost about $30.00 to $60.00 for a front-end alignment, depending on where you take it, and if they have to do a four-wheel alignment you're looking at $80.00 to $125.00.

Answer 10

If the steering wheel is wobbling, then you have either a loose steering column or worn bearings in the column itself. Have it checked out.

good luck.