I would check to make sure your tires are not terribly out of balance or that one of them a bad spot (bulge) or tread separating. Any of these conditions on the front tires could cause the shaking between 40 and 60 mph.
Warped rotors
it sounds alot like a wheel balance is needed....
Your rims are bent and/or your alignment is off. Bent rim, bad tire, loose suspension/steering component.
Could be a small thing like wheels out of balance 40+ "Noisy Inside Car" bad wheel bearings 30+ mph also decelerating harder to control "Steering wheel wobble "on accelerating / decelerating" "Noisy Inside Car" steering linkage: causes the steering wheel to wobble at 40+ mph decelerating harder to control "Steering wheel wobble "on accelerating / decelerating" My brothers car had the above problems I changed his rear spindle, outer, tie rods, "both were shot" bad bearing "blown bearing"
If it shakes all the time it is a tire/wheel problem. If it only shakes when braking then it is a brake problem.
Sounds like your front brake rotors are warped.
That means something in the car is not adjusted properly - something loose, perhaps. Have it checked by a mechanic.
You can huge amounts of WD-40 to the lock cylinder of your lock key and move your key inside and outside many times while trying to turn your ignition on in order to break free your locked steering wheel of your 2003 Ford Focus.
Possible wheel out of round, or mud inside the wheel throwing off the balance.
if your steering column is messed up it will move around and its not suppose to. If your car is pulling it needs an allignment if your steering wheel is off center it needs adjusted and an honest shop can do that cheaply around 40 bucks or so.
in my opinion, im pretty sure a bigger car has to have a bigger steering wheel because a tiny steering wheel would not be able to manuver a big car. great question though:)hope i helped:) love, izzyAnswer 2Some of it has to do with the scale and dynamics of the vehicle, but it's mostly that a larger steering wheel has more leverage. It takes less effort to turn a larger steering wheel than a smaller one. To turn a 15 inch diameter steering wheel half way around, it requires you to turn it about 24 inches. If that wheel was 25 inches in diameter, you'd have to turn it almost 40 inches. It's a bigger lever; you have to turn it more (further), but it is easier to turn.Many older cars without power steering also had more 'turns' to the wheel, which gives the same advantage. My Honda maybe has three turns to the wheel - 'lock to lock' (from all the way left to all the way right). One of the earliest cars I drove may have had 10 turns to the wheel. I remember having to turn it about half way around just to change lanes.
this is a funny way to answer do yo feel the vibration in your but or the steering wheel. If its in your but there is a problem in the rear wheel assembly, ie bad belts in a tire, wheel bering, flat spot on a tire tire out of ballance