Check Your Steering Dampers

VW used rag joints in the old Beetle. When driving around with the body off, it let you have a real co-driver.

So that's what they use to dampen road feel. The best solution would seen to be to weld a cv joint in place of the rag joint. Several rack and pinion setups do this to get the angle between the steering gear and steering wheel right. You'd feel everything that made it past the steering gear with recirculating ball.