Pulsating/grinding Feeling On Steering Wheel

[monty_mm]

Hi guys, i love this LOC, i think its the best ever for giving everyone an opportunity to learn and educate others about the Lexus brand. its my first thread on this website, i just bought a 99 ls400 and love that lexus feeling.

Heres my problem, only one problem to fix to get the car perfect. When i'm driving on the highway, i can feel on the steering wheel a strange feeling a kind of pulsing, as if there are two metals touching. Its a kind of pulse, and gets worse when i'm turning. when i say worse, its not that much and you really have to concentrate to the steering to notice. At lower speeds, i dont feel it that much, Theres no noise or anything, just a pulsing grinding feeling of two metals touching. i went to the lexus shop, they said it was normal but i know it isnt, my brother has exactly the same car and it drives like a dream. i dont think the lexus servicemen had experience to know what exactly was the problem. I hope thatt someone may reply to my thread with the perfect answer.

Thanks.

[nc211]

Hi guys, i love this LOC, i think its the best ever for giving everyone an opportunity to learn and educate others about the Lexus brand. its my first thread on this website, i just bought a 99 ls400 and love that lexus feeling.

Heres my problem, only one problem to fix to get the car perfect. When i'm driving on the highway, i can feel on the steering wheel a strange feeling a kind of pulsing, as if there are two metals touching. Its a kind of pulse, and gets worse when i'm turning. when i say worse, its not that much and you really have to concentrate to the steering to notice. At lower speeds, i dont feel it that much, Theres no noise or anything, just a pulsing grinding feeling of two metals touching. i went to the lexus shop, they said it was normal but i know it isnt, my brother has exactly the same car and it drives like a dream. i dont think the lexus servicemen had experience to know what exactly was the problem. I hope thatt someone may reply to my thread with the perfect answer.

Thanks.

Need a few more answers to narrow it down, but my guess is tie-rod related, but not sure....Answer these below:

1) Does the car wander, pull, shift left to right? If so, when was your last balance & alignment done, and who did it?

2) Do you feel any kind of vibration from the brakes at highway speed? Warped rotors on the LS can be an illusive menace. You won't always get pulsation in the peddle either, which might confuse you from thinking about the rotors. My rear rotors are warped, and when I apply the brakes, I get a low frequency hum with vibration. Second I take foot of the brakes, it goes away, and I have absolutly no peddle vibration at all.

How many miles do you have?

If it's not your brakes, or an alignment / balance thing, then my GUESS is your outer tie rod ends or lower ball joints are going out, which is common in all cars, and their usefull life is subjective to road conditions. They're usually the first parts to go in the steering and ride system, as they take the most abuse, and it's usually the passenger side that fails first. Reason being as most pot holes and debrie are along the curb side of the road.

Since you're getting a pulsation feeling, is speed sensative, then I think it relates to the balancing of your tires. And since you only say you feel it only in the steering wheel, that makes me think one of your outer tie rod ends is worn out, and that imbalancing of the tires is being magnified through the loose connectivity of the tiny ball joint inside of the tie rod end, which is probably where you're getting that metal on metal feeling...aka..the slack is banging against eachother. But, this will also probably be accompanied by a slight wandering sensation in your steering.

Any clunking noises when going over bumps at slow speeds????

[monty_mm]

Well nc211, to answer your questions:

1) the car doesnt wander at all, in fact i replaced my tyres completely 5 days ago (this was because my old tyres were really old), and balancing was done. i didnt do any alignment cause there is no wander.

2) no vibration on brake pedal at highway speed either. When i apply the brakes, there is no vibration and no humming, the previous owner put in new brake discs and never experienced braking problems.

my ls has 115k miles on it so far, it runs like a dream, very very smooth and the engine is superb.

This feeling only comes when i'm turning and its mostly when i'm turning slightly right at high speeds, i know its not from the tyres, and i feel the vibration at say once a second when i'm driving at around 50, so i cant say whether its related to the speed or not, and i feel thats its mostly from the driver side but i cant tell for sure. there is no slight wandering sensation in the steering either, but you have one point, there is a minor clunking noise when i go over bumps, very minor but i know the feeling cause i experience this with my 1990 LS more. do you think that is the reason?? and how can i tell for sure whether its the outer tie rods or the ball joints?? any idea on how much it would cost to repair for either??

thanks again