2004 Toyota Camry Solara Steering Problems

“On march 6, 2016, moving west on a residential street at about 20 MPH 10:45 p.m., less than 500' from home. Crystal clear night. Car freezes, steering & brakes lock, car lurches forward and keeps much higher speed. With both arms, I pulled car from head-on with utility pole to very high palm tree. Head-on ith tree, airbag releases, white smoke coming from hood. I turned car off, took keys, car engine continues as did horn blowing & white smoke. It took three aaa trucks to remove car from tree trunk, with steering and brakes still locked. …”

“With only 27,000 miles on the car, the steering knuckle on my 2004 solara began to fail. This caused looseness in the front end when turning around corners. Previously, my car also suffered from the left pull problem listed on this site. I believe the solara has some very serious problems, but don't know what to do.”

“2004 solara se sport pulls (drifts) to the left. ( dealership spent 3 days on car, performed bulletin# st002-04 including adjustment spring seats and alignment- still pulls left. ) agreed to drive 3,000 miles until next service interval & await new developments from Toyota ) very concerned about issue, I believe there is a manufacuring or design flaw in steering system. I am a quality engineer in import automotive industry with 17 years experience.)”

“Purchased a 2004 Toyota solara. Ever since the day I picked it up the car has drifted to the left. Now with 9000 mile on it ,it has started to pull right once in a while. The dealer has re-alined the front end 5 times and I have also had a private shop do it once . The dealer has completed the work which Toyota sent out on a bulletin however it still drifts. Toyota sent an engineer up from chicago to drive my car, he told me that all Toyota's are designed to drift left due to road crown. Looking at all the same complaints ,I feel he was just singing a story. …”

“My daughter was driving on interstate 10, 5 miles west of crestview florida. She was in left lane, in wet conditions. The steering wheel became out of control causing the car to flip and out of control causing the car to create a hazard and resulting in a total loss. Passangers had to craw out to avoid further injury. Total loss of car and injured two people. This vehicle was issued a NHTSA warning- id- 11v539000. Never received this warning.”