So the steering wheel of my 450h has been shaking for sometime.

Here are some interesting behaviours I’ve found:

1. When the car is in park mode and the accelerator is pressed without engaging the gear, there is no shaking in the body or steering wheel whatsoever when the engine is revving.

2. When driving in normal mode, there is slight shaking in the steering wheel, gear shift lever and the floor when the gauge is in the eco range. When the gauge is in the power range, the shaking is much more pronounced in these areas.

3. When driving in sport mode, there is noticeable shaking in the steering wheel, gear shift lever and the floor when the engine RPM is around 2000. The shaking noticeably decreases when the RPM is below or above the 2000 range.

And what’s more interesting is that the shaking would ‘move around’ sometimes. For example at one point in time, it’s more noticeable on the steering wheel, then next it’d be more so on the floor, sensed by my left foot.

What might the cause here? The car only has traveled 65k miles so far.

 

You speak of engine speed, but not about driving or traveling speed. It sounds as though the problem is most likely coming from a rotating weighted mass (e.g. tires or wheels) that is not in-balance or is out-of-round. I'd recommend having the tires and wheels balanced and checked out for possible damage with primary focus being the tires and wheels on the front of the car.

 

I feel like the shaking is not relevant to driving speed as the car is relatively smooth in highway as long as the engine is not around 2000. And also when the car is in electric mode, no shaking at all, regardless of the driving speed.

 

Get the Engine/transmission mounts inspected. Common cause for vibration felt in the cabin. Especially if it correlates to rpm.

Hope it helps!

 

Cool, I’ll give it a shot. Really appreciate your help!

 

I know it’s been a while. But per your suggestion, I’ve got the engine/transmission mounts all replaced. And it does help reduce majority of the vibration. Now the only place I can sense it is from my foot, both on the accelerator and footrest. It’s still rpm related. So I guess the new mount absorbs most of the vibration, but it’s not the root cause? It must stem from either the engine or transmission?