Symptom
Shaking transmitted through the seat, floor or steering wheel, usually from a cylinder not contributing evenly. On a four-cylinder engine one weak cylinder is a quarter of the output, so the vibration is pronounced.
Also described as: vibration, shaking, juddering, shuddering, rough running, car shakes, engine shaking, لرزش کل خودرو, ماشین میلرزد, ویبره در بدنه, coche vibra, carro vibra, siento vibraciones, vibraciones al conducir, tiembla coche, tiembla carro, tiembla auto, اهتزاز في السيارة, رجة في السيارة, السيارة ترتج, اهتزاز في سيارتي, سيارتي ترتج
108 of the 182 codes that produce this symptom indicate a fault where continuing to drive risks damage or is unsafe. If the symptom is sudden or severe, treat it as one of those until a scan says otherwise.
Establish first whether the vibration follows engine speed or road speed, because that single question separates two entire systems. A vibration that changes with the rev counter and is present with the car stationary is the engine. A vibration that changes with how fast the car is travelling and disappears when you stop is wheels, tyres or driveline — and no amount of engine diagnosis will touch it.
The engine population is dominated by one cylinder not pulling its weight, and the reason it is felt so strongly is arithmetic. On a four-cylinder engine one weak cylinder is a quarter of the output, and the loss arrives once per two revolutions rather than smoothly — so the engine rocks on its mountings at a low frequency the body transmits well. The same fault on a six or an eight is noticeably less violent, which is worth knowing before dismissing a complaint as exaggerated.
Mountings turn a small fault into a large complaint, and they can also be the whole fault. Their job is to absorb exactly this, so a collapsed mounting lets an ordinary, healthy engine shake the cabin. The test that separates them is free: an engine fault is present in neutral and in gear alike, while a mounting fault is far worse under load — which is why this vocabulary keeps a separate entry for roughness that appears only with drive selected.
Road-speed vibration has its own short list — wheel balance, a bent rim, a tyre with a displaced belt, a worn driveshaft joint, or a warped brake disc if it appears only under braking. The discriminator is smoothness: a balance problem grows and fades gradually with speed, where a driveline or converter fault tends to arrive and leave at a particular point.
| What you find | Likely cause | How to confirm it | What fixes it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Follows engine speed, present with the car stationary | One cylinder not contributing — ignition, injector or compression | Read misfire counters per cylinder. Swap the coil or injector to another cylinder and see whether the count follows it. | Renew what the count follows. A compression or leak-down test settles it when neither swap moves the fault. |
| Follows road speed, absent when stationary | Wheels, tyres or driveline rather than the engine | Note whether it varies smoothly with speed — balance — or arrives and leaves at one point, which points at a driveline or lock-up fault. | Balance or renew the wheel or tyre; renew the driveshaft joint where play is found. Do not diagnose the engine for this. |
| Much worse in gear at a standstill than in neutral | A collapsed or uncontrolled engine mounting — the engine is unchanged and what holds it is not | Compare directly in neutral and in drive with the brake held. Inspect the mountings for collapse, splits or leaked fluid. | Renew the mounting. On an active mounting, check its vacuum or electrical control before condemning the mounting itself. |
| Vibration that appeared with a rough idle and rising consumption | A weak cylinder rather than a mechanical imbalance — the vibration is a symptom of the misfire | Read trims and misfire counters together. Both moving points at combustion rather than at mountings. | Repair the misfire; the vibration goes with it. Renewing mountings here treats the symptom. |
| Only under braking | Brake discs with excessive run-out or uneven deposits | Measure disc run-out and thickness variation. Note that the vibration is through the pedal and steering rather than the seat. | Machine or renew the discs, and check the wheel bearings and hub face while they are off. |
| Started immediately after tyre, clutch or engine work | Something not balanced, not torqued, or reassembled with a mounting misaligned | Retrace what was done. A vibration dating from an exact job is rarely a coincidence. | Re-balance, re-torque or re-align. Cheapest cause on the page and routinely investigated last. |
Follows engine speed, present with the car stationary
Follows road speed, absent when stationary
Much worse in gear at a standstill than in neutral
Vibration that appeared with a rough idle and rising consumption
Only under braking
Started immediately after tyre, clutch or engine work
Listed with the codes that most typically present this way first — the likeliest place to start.
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Have anything you intend to act on checked by a trained person against the manufacturer's own procedure for your vehicle. Nothing here replaces that procedure.
An engine mount has two jobs that pull in opposite directions, and everything about it is a compromise between them. It must be stiff enough to hold a heavy engine still — against...
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