Yeah, I thought the alignment might be slightly off. I looked at it and I can't see any noticeable difference. The car tracks straight 99% of the time, although if it does drift it almost always does so to the left. I wouldn't be surprised if the alignment is just a hair off. It returns to center well from both directions, I just notice that while its quick from the right and centers right to about 12 o'clock, from the left it's slightly slower and tends to stop about 11-11:30 so to speak. It will come all the way back to 12 o'clock from the left if you're on the gas. It's so slight though I doubt that the dealer or an alignment shop would say its off. I dunno. I guess I'll keep an eye on it and have the alignment checked if it gets any worse. Could drive train design have any effect on this? I know some cars that are FWD can have some tirque steer and if you get on the gas from a full stop the wheel will turn right slightly. Thanks!

 

ah, coming back depending on throttle is torque steer - where the transmission is applying a little more power to one wheel than the other, which causes it to be a little crooked. I don't think it's anything to be worried about if it's only when you're on the gas, though you should be able to go straight down the middle of a flat road (with no traffic of course) and not always pull to one side. Usually when going 60 in cruise it will drift to one side of the road or the other after a few seconds (like 5 max). This is about the best you can hope for with most vehicles, and a normal alignment.

If your wheels are wearing evenly I wouldn't worry about it. Though the 3, along with some other mazda models, have the camber set up screwy to provide performace. So the front tires wear more on the outside and the rears on the inside - good reason to rotate tires. But in all cases the tread blocks should all be flat, when one edge is higher than the other on the tire there's a definite alignment issue.

I recall my RX7 that had manual steering I got aligned well enough that it would slowly wander across the road but always return to the center line where there's a crest in the road. That is ideal, but it only occurred on a new road that didn't have 'dips' from standard traffic. If you pay attention you can see the car pulling differently depending where you are in the road ruts, some people drive on one side or the other, and that may be all you're feeling with the speed to get back to center - all depends exactly where you start in the road ruts.

 

Good day,
I know these post are very old but I have a Mazda 3 2013 (as around 13 000KM) which have similar problems and it just feel very bad. It gives the impression that the steering will not totally come back to center position by it self and that it is a little bit easier to turn then before because of the lack of tension to keep it in center position. I can tell I don't have as much fun to drive it as it used to be at first when I got it and now feel a little bit deseparate. Dealer is telling me that everything is fine (they checked the alignement and the suspension).

I was wondering if any of you have finally found what could cause this issue?

Thanks

 

If you have the problem on a 2013, remember you have a warranty, and make sure they fix anything you're not happy with - cause they will do their best to delay a costly repair (if it's repairable) until after the warranty is up. At least that's what i've seen happen with a couple different brands & dealers of friends.

I have always had mine pull to the left I think on acceleration - just a tiny bit, and thats before and after alignments, camber adjusts and all, so I think that's a torque steer thing. I have not noticed any different effort needed to turn right vs left though.

Another thought, if there was some mis-adjustment in the steering wheel angle sensor. That's installed as part of the stability control system so the car knows where you're pointing and it looks at lateral forces to determine if your car is sliding or not.
One way to check this is to go into a slide to the right and left (yay there's snow out there) & see if the stability control kicks in at the same point. If it's way off that could be due to the wheel position not being properly detected... at least I think that would show up as a problem and asymmetric response.