Mazda Repair: intermittent, violent shaking from front end, ball joints, vering

Question
Hello,

I have a '93 Probe GT with 170K on it, and coming up the freeway this morning something awful started happening.  Cruising down the freeway just fine, then out of nowhere I got a violent shake from the car.  Thinking it is the front end, I move the steering wheel left and right and the shaking goes away.  I immediately turned around to go back home.  On the way home this violent shimmy / shutter / shaking, came and gone, but only went away after steering right and left until it went away.  now this shaking doesn't appear to affect the steering of the car at all.  It seems to me it may be a ball joint issue, but i'm not knowledgeble on front end problems.  Any help on this would be great because I would like to spend as little on this old car as possible.

Thanks much,
Brad


Answer
the front end ball joints can be the problem and are easy to check just jack the car up and move the tire top to bottom and feel for play if there's alot you have a ball joint problem tie robs can also be checked that way but from side to side move the tire. you may also have an alignment issue. just drive down the road and see if your car starts to pull to the left or right, a little to the right is normal (it provents the car from vering into the other lane)