AtWhatMileage
Steering · 30 owner reports

Other steering problem on the 2009 Toyota Camry

5 crashes 2 injuries 7 of the 30 reports for this failure mention a crash, a fire, an injury or a death. Those are the owner's words on the complaint form, not a verified finding, and one report can mention more than one.

Reports of this failure 30
With an odometer reading 24
Reports per 1,000 built 0.3 per 1,000
Filed below 36,000 miles 54%
Mention a crash, fire or injury 7
Typical repair $350–$2,400
What it means when it happens High
Rank among this year's problems 12th

When other steering problem gets reported

Owners of the 2009 Toyota Camry report other steering problem at a median of 30,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 5,000 miles and a quarter after 80,000 miles, from 24 reports that carried an odometer reading.

A part like this is normally expected to survive 95,000 miles. It is the 12th most-reported problem on this model year.

The mileage distribution

The reported range runs from 100 miles at the tenth percentile to 130,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 128,826 miles across the middle 80% of reports.

When the reports scatter this far, the mileage is telling you about how these cars were driven more than about the part itself.

54% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.

The whole distribution

Percentiles of the 24 odometer readings owners gave.
10th25thMedian 75th90th
144 miles 6,250 miles 28,566 miles 77,500 miles 128,970 miles

Read the 10th percentile as “one report in ten arrived this early”. Exact figures are shown in this table because it is the table of record; everywhere else on the site they are rounded to the precision the sample can carry.

What a percentile can and cannot tell you here

These five numbers describe the readings owners gave, in order. The median is the middle one: half the reports arrived below it. The 10th and 90th are the edges of the bulk of the distribution, and the distance between them is the part worth reading. A tight spread — say 70,000 to 95,000 miles — points at something that wears out on a schedule, and the schedule is knowable. A wide one, 20,000 to 190,000, points at a fault that hits some cars and never troubles others, which means the mileage on the listing in front of you tells you very little about your odds.

What these figures are not is a survival curve. Every reading here comes from a car whose owner filed a complaint, so the sample contains only failures: it cannot say what share of the fleet made it past 150,000 miles untouched, because those owners had nothing to report. Nor is the mileage the moment of failure — it is the odometer reading as recalled at the time of filing, which may be weeks later and is sometimes rounded to the nearest ten thousand by the person typing it.

Percentiles are shown at all only once 8 readings exist for the vehicle and mode. Below that the middle of a handful of numbers is noise wearing a decimal point, so the figures are withheld rather than dressed up.

What happens, and what it costs

Of these reports, 5 a crash and 2 an injury are mentioned. Owners write their own complaints and the agency does not verify them, so read this as what the reports say happened rather than as a confirmed count.

Putting it right typically runs $350–$2,400 at an independent US shop. That range is an editorial estimate held in this site's failure-mode catalogue, not a figure from NHTSA, and it is a repair cost rather than a diagnosis cost.

The same failure on other years

The same failure is reported on 26 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2020, at a median of 1,300 miles, and latest on the 1999 at 130,000 miles.

By volume the 2015 carries the most reports, with 86; the 2009 has 30. A mode that appears across most years of a model is usually a design choice rather than a bad batch.

If one year stands out to the left, that is the year to avoid; if the whole line sits at a similar mileage, this is wear rather than a defect in one production run.

Median
  1. 1996 Toyota Camry other steering problem 62k
  2. 1997 Toyota Camry other steering problem 75k
  3. 1998 Toyota Camry other steering problem 130k
  4. 1999 Toyota Camry other steering problem 131k
  5. 2000 Toyota Camry other steering problem 18k
  6. 2001 Toyota Camry other steering problem 82k
  7. 2002 Toyota Camry other steering problem 53k
  8. 2003 Toyota Camry other steering problem 17k
  9. 2004 Toyota Camry other steering problem 25k
  10. 2005 Toyota Camry other steering problem 49k
  11. 2006 Toyota Camry other steering problem 66k
  12. 2007 Toyota Camry other steering problem 50k
  13. 2008 Toyota Camry other steering problem 41k
  14. 2009 (this one) 29k
  15. 2010 Toyota Camry other steering problem 8k
  16. 2011 Toyota Camry other steering problem 32k
  17. 2012 Toyota Camry other steering problem 24k
  18. 2013 Toyota Camry other steering problem 5k
  19. 2014 Toyota Camry other steering problem 8k
  20. 2015 Toyota Camry other steering problem 50k
  21. 2016 Toyota Camry other steering problem 61k
  22. 2017 Toyota Camry other steering problem 50k
  23. 2018 Toyota Camry other steering problem 49k
  24. 2019 Toyota Camry other steering problem 24k
  25. 2020 Toyota Camry other steering problem 1k
  26. 2021 Toyota Camry other steering problem 90k
  27. 2022 Toyota Camry other steering problem
    no odometer readings given
    —
  28. 2023 Toyota Camry other steering problem
    no odometer readings given
    —
  29. 2024 Toyota Camry other steering problem
    no odometer readings given
    —
  30. 2025 Toyota Camry other steering problem
    no odometer readings given
    —

Tick median reported mileage Solid middle half of reports Faint 10th to 90th percentile Colour how bad the failure is when it happens

What owners wrote

Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.

I purchased my 2009 camry in 2008 mid summer, everything is fine except that at or about 8000 miles I notice that the alignment was off and it would pull slightly to the left. I took the vehicle into the dealership and the problem seemed to be fixed. At or about 12,000 miles, the alignment was off and still pulling to the left again. It seems there is a problem with the alignment and I feel that it should be looked at. *tr

8,000 miles NHTSA complaint 713972 filed 2009-03-28

Tl*the contact owns a 2009 toyota camry. Whenever the contact drove the vehicle at any speeds including 20 MPH, he noticed that the vehicle would slightly pull to the left. The vehicle was taken to the dealer where the contact had all four tires replaced which included a steering alignment; however, the failure has continued to occur. The failure has occurred since the vehicle was purchased. The current and failure mileages were 25000.

25,000 miles NHTSA complaint 752743 filed 2010-01-15

Purchased 2009 toyota camry (with 11,000 miles - demo , on the drive home noticed it was pulling to the right. Being a new car, we scheduled to have it fixed, and on ride home, it pulled to the left. At times during the ride, it seemed to switch pulling between the right and left . The car is practically brand new (12,000 miles)with no damage from owners. *tr

11,000 miles NHTSA complaint 761014 filed 2010-02-09

Also reported on the 2009 Toyota Camry

Other body or interior problem

229 reports median 60k

Other speed control problem

218 reports median 18k

Excessive oil consumption

144 reports median 99k

Other visibility problem

120 reports median 72k

Other engine problem

100 reports median 79k

Other brake problem

68 reports median 30k

How far this goes

Complaints are voluntary, so 30 is a floor and not a count of affected cars. Mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers. And the mode itself is assigned by software reading the complaint text, which is reliable in bulk and fallible one report at a time.

Questions this page answers

At what mileage does other steering problem happen on the 2009 Toyota Camry?

Across 24 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 30,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 5,000 miles and a quarter after 80,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.

How common is other steering problem on the 2009 Toyota Camry?

30 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.3 per 1,000 vehicles. Complaints are voluntary, so this is a floor rather than a count of affected cars.

What this is and is not. These are the mileages at which owners chose to complain to a federal agency, which is not the same as the mileage at which the part fails on every car. It skews toward failures that happened outside warranty, cost real money, or frightened someone. It is still the only public dataset that carries failure mileage at all, and the shape of a few hundred readings is informative even when a single one is not. Methodology · JSON · this failure on other cars

Source Owner complaints and recall records published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, model years 1996–2027 Figures rebuilt Published by AtWhatMileage How every figure is computed