Hello everyone, i recently picked up my Dad's 02 Jaguar X-type 2.5L manual. He let it sit for about 4-6 months before i bought it off him. It has 189,000 miles, but he was the second owner and bought it with 60,000 back in 05. He kept up on oil changes, brakes, belts, replaced that rubber tube on the top of the engine, and didn't drive it to hard. The occasional 120+. Head liner is falling down. Overall though great car.

Since i have owned it i replaced the oil and transmission fluid. The rear differential makes sort of a humming noise, almost like a jet engine taking off in the back seat, i am assuming that oil also needs to be replaced, and i plan on replacing the plugs seeing as my father never had that done.

To my problem. The steering wheel shimmy's back and forth after i hit a small bump, bumpy pavement (55+), or take a corner, its very slight but i can feel some force fighting my hand, eventually it smooths out. Especially if i am on good pavement. I don't hear anything clunk or bang when i am cornering, even making a hard u-turn, nothing. Any ideas would be appreciated i am about to go check the ball-joints, and visual inspect some of the control arm bushings.

Thanks,
Justin

 

Justin, first off, welcome to the Forums. Lots of good information here with great people. We pride ourselves in being a better car group. But, as part of this, we like to get to know one another. So, please stop by the New Member Section and tell us a little bit about yourself and your car. This will also give you a chance to meet up with those that make this place what it is.

As for your problem, the first thing I would do is to get an alignment done on the car. Sometimes if the alignment is off by a little bit, it will put a wiggle in the steering wheel at roughly 60-70 mph. If the shimmy is still there, then I would recommend having your wheel rotated and seeing if the shimmy changes. If it smooths out, then you have a bent rim on one of your now rear wheels. If it gets worse, one of your front wheels is bent more than your rear ones. If you have the tires balanced, you can have the tech look at the tread as he is balancing the tire and you will be able to see the tread wobble with a bent rim.

The last thing it can possibly be is that you have worn out struts on the front end and your front tires are significantly worn on the inside edge and the tires are starting to cup on you. This will cause the steering wheel to wobble.

You don't mention a hum from the front of the car. IF the front wheel bearings are going, they can result in a shake in the front end and normally you can do a quick lane change when the humming is going on and when you make it one way, the noise will be constant, but when you do it the other way, the noise will go away. The direction that the noise goes away is the side that the bad wheel bearing is. Kinda like your hum in the rear may be a bad wheel bearing, not a bad differential.

 

We just got our 2002 X-Type 2.5L a few days ago. The steering wheel slightly (.25-0.5 in) rotates side to side at low speeds (0-10 mph) but then smooths out at higher speeds. Not sure if it is an AWD thing or not. No pulling to either side at low or high speeds, just the steering wheel shimmies a little at low speed. Low tire pressure maybe???