Steering Problems

ver2025 · January 29, 2006

Our 2004 RX 330 will not track straight. At almost any uneven pavement the car will go in any direction, except straight. We have (and have had) several cars of lesser quality than the Lexus, but I have never experienced this. We are now at about 25000 miles and the dealer has "looked" at this a number of times. To no avail and they tell us there is nothing wrong with the steering. We have 5 drivers in our family and everyone of them complains about this. Not my imagination in other words. Long trips are a real problem. You have to steer the car constantly.

They have done wheel alignements and rotated struts and rotated tires.

Does anyone have a suggestion as to what we might do?

Thanks

Lexusfreak · January 29, 2006

I think your in the wrong thread bud......needs to be moved to the RX forum. B)

:cheers:

stonecutter · January 30, 2006

Our 2004 RX 330 will not track straight. At almost any uneven pavement the car will go in any direction, except straight. We have (and have had) several cars of lesser quality than the Lexus, but I have never experienced this. We are now at about 25000 miles and the dealer has "looked" at this a number of times. To no avail and they tell us there is nothing wrong with the steering. We have 5 drivers in our family and everyone of them complains about this. Not my imagination in other words. Long trips are a real problem. You have to steer the car constantly.

They have done wheel alignements and rotated struts and rotated tires.

Does anyone have a suggestion as to what we might do?

Thanks

My experience in dealing with auto repairs has been that unless the technician(s) can easily replicate (and therefore analyze) the symptoms, the usual response is they can't find anything wrong. Have you driven the service advisor to the spots where you know the car won't steer straight ?

ccw2006rx330 · February 1, 2006

I've noticed that my wife's RX330 with 18 inch wheels requires a lot more steering correction than other cars we've owned. Not that it tracks erratically, or consistently pulls to one side, just that it tends to follow the crown of the road more than I'm used to. We got adjusted to it quickly so I haven't spoken to the dealer.

golfinbud · February 1, 2006

After raising the same issue with the dealer where I bought my 1999 RX300, I've been told by their mechanic (after checking the alignment, tire pressures & doing tire rotation) that there's this natural tendency for these light to med AWD SUVs to pull (to the left in my case) even you're in a leveled road because of the vehicle's powertrain design (being the engine mounted crosswise unlike to the bigger SUVs where engines are parallel to the chassis) where even transfer of power from the engine, tranny to the wheels are more of a suitable design for 4x4 or AWD .

How true is this claim remains to be seen - considering that these are high priced vehicles, just hard to imagine that this can be a flaw in Lexus'es design (like their trannies) although there's still that possiblity especially mine being their first year to come out with the RX. I just don't pay that much attention to this problem anymore but of course the proper solution is out there and will surely be a convenience if this will be addressed accordingly, so that somehow I can relax my hands from keeping my wheels drive straight.

Rx330driver · February 3, 2006

I also have the 2004 rx330 with the 18 inch wheels. I dont feel any side steering from the car itself. THe steering is light and sometimes, i dont even need to steer on the freeway, maybe a light tap to keep it straight.