Steering wheel shake at highway speeds

riceburner said:

Ah yes i know what you are talking about now, light long fast speed turns, like when the highway is curving, i get it real bad one way or the other. not all too bad around onramps, which i usually take at twice the posted limit

as far as the swaybar goes, i can see how having soft bar, soft (or worn out) mounts could lead to more play and bouncing around at speed.

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Oh for sure. I've taken tight on ramps hard enough at speed to get the back end kicking out a bit and no vibrations at all then. I think I'm gonna talk to my shop tomorrow about getting the sway bar, end links, bushings, all that good stuff done.

I’m going to say my guess here is that after looking into this a little that you both may have a front shock/strut issue on either one or both sides, it’s also just occurred to me that I had a similar symptom on my old MK4 R32 when one of the front shocks had seized solid (yours aren’t necessarily seized) which probably resulted in the other side skipping/bouncing! It may not be your issue but worth consideration, especially as you say the shaking is at all speeds which progressively gets worse.

EDIT: a VAG tuner friend of mine tells me if the car shakes at all speeds above 40mph then he would suspect bad shocks! Especially given the other things you’ve replaced.

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Carlosfandango said:

I’m going to say my guess here is that after looking into this a little that you both may have a front shock/strut issue on either one or both sides, it’s also just occurred to me that I had a similar symptom on my old MK4 R32 when one of the front shocks had seized solid (yours aren’t necessarily seized) which probably resulted in the other side skipping/bouncing! It may not be your issue but worth consideration, especially as you say the shaking is at all speeds which progressively gets worse.


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I have noticed a good amount of squeaking from my shocks when going over speed bumps or other uneven surfaces at lower speeds. I suppose it's always a possibility that they could be going bad as well. Any ideas on how to check if the shocks/struts could be going bad? If it's something easy to do, I'll just do it on my own instead of paying a diagnostic fee from a shop.

bluesrocker137 said:

I have noticed a good amount of squeaking from my shocks when going over speed bumps or other uneven surfaces at lower speeds. I suppose it's always a possibility that they could be going bad as well. Any ideas on how to check if the shocks/struts could be going bad? If it's something easy to do, I'll just do it on my own instead of paying a diagnostic fee from a shop.

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Have you checked the subframe? It could be loose.


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Carlosfandango said:

Have you checked the subframe? It could be loose.


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They subframe bolts have all been checked and torqued to spec, I insisted on that the first time I had this car at the current shop.

bluesrocker137 said:

They subframe bolts have all been checked and torqued to spec, I insisted on that the first time I had this car at the current shop.

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Yeah, I thought you would have, but as you mentioned squeaking at slow speeds I thought it was worth highlighting.


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^usually think that ties into the strut mounts, which i can't fully see allowing such extreme vibration but shiiiit you never know

riceburner said:

^usually think that ties into the strut mounts, which i can't fully see allowing such extreme vibration but shiiiit you never know

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When my subframe was loose it sounded like an old wooden ship as well as the odd knocking sound! However lately I’m also getting slow speed squeaks from the top mount area along with a little bit of knocking but only at very slow speeds like when turning into a junction on a rough road [emoji35] can’t pinpoint it though?, I don’t have any shaking whatsoever though!


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The longer it goes, the more I question the integrity of the entire suspensions in our cars. So many people have similar issues stemming from any variety of things, it seems like the whole thing is just teetering on the brink waiting for one little thing to go wrong. I drove on the highway for a bit today, and looking at this objectively, 55-70mph isn't THAT bad. If you didn't know anything about cars and/or didn't care about driving, you might not be that bothered by the shaking. It's more like a vibration felt in the steering wheel at that point. When you go anywhere near 80mph though, the steering wheel wants to shake itself out of your hands. I talked to another shop the other day, and (I'm not kidding here...) their solution was to "just go slower". If I didn't care about driving fast, I would've bought a regular Golf or any variety of econo-box made to get good gas mileage and be a mundane commuter car. I think my next course of action is to try one more shop to get a fresh set of eyes on the problem, my buddy has used a tuning shop about an hour and a half away from me in Maryland and had nothing good to say, but I might just be at the point where if they find nothing visibly wrong, I just need to sell the car and accept the fact that I'll be losing a decent portion of my last year's paycheck in the process...

In my case I don’t think there’s anything wrong with the suspension as such, I’m at 127000miles and the components are simply tired, the subframe was fixed with new Audi bolts and shims, and the top mount squeak/tapping (which in reality is very quiet) only happens at VERY slow speed since I had New lower control arms/bushes/ball joints on the front, i fitted new arb links as that’s what the tapping noise sounds like so it’s not those, I simply think that as the other components are renewed and are back in spec and firm it has pulled the mounts/bearings back to their proper “un settled/tired” position where they are now the week link so to speak so it’s probably just time for replacement due to normal use, my car is so very quiet and squeak/rattle free that I notice this minor noise and to be honest most wouldn’t even hear it, I don’t think there is a problem with the integrity of the suspension on these cars in general , there’s something simple causing your problem I’m sure, it could well be the hubs/bearings but it’s so hard to diagnose an issue through the internet, maybe post up a video of the shaking as the speed increases.


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^ the top mounts can squeak due to cold weather too man... i know it sucks but seems to be the reality of it. Sailkote (sp?) helps address squeaky door deals and may also aid in that endeavor... dont sure if thats something you want 'lubed up' however.

Bluerocker, dont give up man! i'm kind of with you; it could even come down to some simple factory design where the geometry must not allow all stresspoints to work with eachother; like it's always counting on one or two bushings and other parts are not being utilized due to how it sits... i dunno but i'm with you, this is something we could be chasing our tails on forever. or, maybe you are almost at the brink of having a perfect car again.

That's what's bugging me here. There's no way I'm sinking several thousand more dollars into this car, but what if I'm only a few hundred away? Like I previously said, I think my best course of action at this point is to take it to another shop and see what they have to say. I trust my usual mechanic completely, but maybe it's just something he's not picking up on that another person would. Carlosfandango, I wish I had your luck lol. It's funny almost, you see people with GTI's who have racked up well over 100k and have next to no issues, and then you have people like myself who started seeing problems at well under half that mileage, or some people from factory showroom new even.

I hate the thought of moving on though, for the simple fact that I chose the GTI in the first place because it was the only hot hatch to offer a dual clutch auto as opposed to the traditional manual. I love driving manual as much as the next guy when I'm tearing up a backroad for the fun of it, but it kinda sucks when sitting in stop and go traffic on my commute from work. Plus these days a stickshift comes with the unfortunate problem of friends/girlfriends/family members possibly not being able to drive your car should they ever need to. But I digress, I'm not entirely sure what I'm going to do here, however should I find some kind of solution I'll be sure to let y'all know!

I wouldn’t say I’ve had no issues! I’ve had a complete NEW cylinder head, rear main, 3 PCV’s, rear shocks and top mounts , 3 sets of drop links on the back, rear lower control arms, 2 water pumps, battery, front drop links, front lower control arms, ball joints, front wheel bearing hub, new tensioner(preventative measure), dual mass flywheel, clutch, radiator and some other minor bits and pieces, but the thing is many people would have driven around without doing most of this work without a second thought! At the end of the day it runs sweet and it’s a great car in great condition, there will be lots of other cars out there that are in a much much worse shape and yes they haven’t had the things done I have but that’s what makes mine a better car, at my mileage it not going to stay as New forever!


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Yeah it's amazing, my MK7 was shaking too even around 80mph, when i got it it only had like 15k miles? WTF?

I've had a highway shake from around 75mph+ for 2-3 years now. It started completely out of the blue, was on the highway one day and suddenly had a shake. Since then I've made numerous part changes along the way that have made no difference. New wheel bearings, tie rod ends, different set of coilovers (may have even started before the prior set of coilovers as well), different wheels, more than one set of tires, and adjustable sway bar end links. All but the bearings and rod ends were just modifications along the course of time. Subframe is tight, no play found in the front control arm bushings (SuperPro ALK handles the rear mounting point), engine and trans mounts upgraded to Vibratecnics last year. No play at all when the wheel is lifted off ground and shaken and can't feel any play in the axle joints. It's super annoying since I ride the PA Turnpike often which has a 70mph speed limit and traffic that moves closer to 80. Thinking of replacing the driveshafts next in case it is the inner CV joint (even though it feels fine by hand). Car drives totally fine and smooth up til mid 70's. I would LOVE to get this solved. I plan on trying the replacement driveshafts soon, will report back if any change.

Edit-Forgot to add I also changed out the ball joints with SuperPro roll center correcting units when I did the bearings and rod ends