Technical Steering noise/vibration?

[soldierboy]

Hi, first post here.
I have an 06 Fiat Panda dynamique (from new). 35,000 miles, serviced every 12 months, just passed its first MOT. My problem is a noise/vibration through the steering which I assume is coming from the power steering unit. It starts as soon as the engine is started and goes on and off depending on the position of the steering. The fault stays on even after a long journey and it makes no difference if I have "city" on or off. I have no warning lights on the dash and the car behaves normally except for this fault. I'm taking the car to france on holiday in 2 weeks so need to know is this something potentially major which I need to get fixed now, can it wait, or is there a simple fix I can do myself?
All replies greatfully received.

Thanks, soldierboy.

 

[emmetfox]

Hi, First post:

I have the same problem, just bought a 3yr old Grande Punto (9000miles), and i'm getting noise and vibration through the steering wheel. there's also a lot of play in city mode and friends and family all agree the general feeling of the steering feels wierd.

Also, the car veers to the left when I take my hands off the wheel by about 1 metre in 10. Scary biscuits...

Does anybody know what is causing this??

 

[trackdayqueen]

Hi, First post:

I have the same problem, just bought a 3yr old Grande Punto (9000miles), and i'm getting noise and vibration through the steering wheel. there's also a lot of play in city mode and friends and family all agree the general feeling of the steering feels wierd.

Also, the car veers to the left when I take my hands off the wheel by about 1 metre in 10. Scary biscuits...

Does anybody know what is causing this??

If the car veers to one side of the road then the toe is bound to be out. Garages will refer to it as 'tracking', ie the front wheels need to be pointing at the same angle (which will involve toe-in) when the steering wheel is in the straight ahead position. I would get the toe sorted asap because it will cause uneven tyre wear and is obviously disconcerting. It will affect handling too.

As for the steering wheel vibration, I have no idea. I have a problem with steering vibration that i've had on my 100hp that's been going on pretty much since i've had it. I just get a resonance on 'knobbly' road services. I just can't be bothered to take it back to the dealer again. It's a minor annoyance really.

 

[306maxi]

Hi, First post:

I have the same problem, just bought a 3yr old Grande Punto (9000miles), and i'm getting noise and vibration through the steering wheel. there's also a lot of play in city mode and friends and family all agree the general feeling of the steering feels wierd.

Also, the car veers to the left when I take my hands off the wheel by about 1 metre in 10. Scary biscuits...

Does anybody know what is causing this??

You should post in the Grande Punto forum. This is the Panda forum.

 

[Most Easterly Pandas]

You should post in the Grande Punto forum. This is the Panda forum.

Lol. Only just noticed the date of the OP compaired to the 2nd post

 

[MikeySkiBoy]

Similar problems on my 2006 1.3JTD Panda Dynamic

Recent problem: When turning the steering wheel at low speed an intermittent noise may be heard and an accompanying slight vibration felt through the wheel. Noticeable when turning right or left, but possibly more to the left.

Older problem: When moving off slowly from standing, wheel turns quickly to the left and car veers off in that direction. This is a real pain when creeping along in traffic.

When stopped on a very icy road, the wheel will spin to the left with the car at a standstill!!!

If I slow down to a very slow speed, similar to the moving off speed scenario described above, the wheel still turns slightly to the left, but is nowhere near as bad.

Car veers slightly to left at higher speed but, is really not that bad and may be attributed to road camber.

The front tyres were changed about a month ago and I have double checked the pressures. Car was veering left before then. The noise and vibration have only been noticed in the last 2 weeks and the tyres had been on for two weeks before that, without any noise being heard.

All in it's a great wee car. I was hoping that there would be a Haynes manual available for me to do a bit of DIY, but they don't seem to do one. I would have thought that would have been a good seller for Haynes.

Does anyone have any thoughts on what either of these problems may be?

Any DIY solutions, suggestions or troubleshooting ideas would be gratefully received.

 

[Andy Monty]

Re: Similar problems on my 2006 1.3JTD Panda Dynamic

Recent problem: When turning the steering wheel at low speed an intermittent noise may be heard and an accompanying slight vibration felt through the wheel. Noticeable when turning right or left, but possibly more to the left.

Older problem: When moving off slowly from standing, wheel turns quickly to the left and car veers off in that direction. This is a real pain when creeping along in traffic.

When stopped on a very icy road, the wheel will spin to the left with the car at a standstill!!!

If I slow down to a very slow speed, similar to the moving off speed scenario described above, the wheel still turns slightly to the left, but is nowhere near as bad.

Car veers slightly to left at higher speed but, is really not that bad and may be attributed to road camber.

The front tyres were changed about a month ago and I have double checked the pressures. Car was veering left before then. The noise and vibration have only been noticed in the last 2 weeks and the tyres had been on for two weeks before that, without any noise being heard.

All in it's a great wee car. I was hoping that there would be a Haynes manual available for me to do a bit of DIY, but they don't seem to do one. I would have thought that would have been a good seller for Haynes.

Does anyone have any thoughts on what either of these problems may be?

Any DIY solutions, suggestions or troubleshooting ideas would be gratefully received.

Thats a Dangerous fault needing the column replacing Not really a DIY job as you need the special Fiat computer to calibrate the sensors on the column (athough you can fit the column and fiat dealer can calibrate BUT if you have a duff/faulty/you made a mistake installing the column they will still want paying for the attempted calibration,,,,,,

 

[MikeySkiBoy]

Oh dear!

That's not good news. The car came with a 30 day warranty when I bought it in September, which has now expired. Thing is it has only done 9K in 3 and a half years. I will have to see what my local FIAT dealer says about it then.

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear! Looks like I should have bit the bullet and bought a new one.

Thanks for the quick reply.

 

[klop]

Hi MikeySkiBoy - I know thread is many moons old but if you're reading this - di you get your Panda fixed - it reads very similar to what is now happening with ours!

Thanks

 

[DaveMcT]

There are threads about replacing the torque sensors on the power steering. It might not need a new steering motor.

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=fiat+panda+power+seering+torque+sensor

 

[power steering guru]

Hi Panda owners

We have extensive experience with the Panda electric steering columns , and have written a Panda blog about this fault, we at western power steering see the groaning/vibration fault all the time, the reason for this is indeed the torque position sensor going faulty.

We offer two solutions for this, either a replacement top part of the column that contains a new sensor fitted and centred, when this is then fitted to your existing motor/control unit you will need to have the unit calibrated as the steering control unit needs to know the values of the new sensor, this needs a scanner to do this but does not have to go to a Fiat main dealer, most decent garages with up to date kit should be able to do this.

Our second solution is a complete column assembly with torque sensor and motor/ecu included, in this case it should not need calibrating as we have already done this when we have tested the column on our test rig.

If anybody from the forum goes to our site they can get 5% discount at the checkout by using the discount code forum5 , I am also more than happy for people to phone me and I can give you any help or advice that relates to Fiat EPS problems.
Our new website is: shop.westernpowersteering.co.uk
Tel. 0117-9602906
Just ask for myself Gary.