So I have been battling death wobble for a while. It was fine for years till it started getting a bit of a shake occasionally when i hit a bump. In a short period of time it quickly developed into full blown death wobble. Now I can't go over 50-60km/h. TJ hasn't been offroad during this time or had anywork/adjustments done so its obviously a wear problem.
Specs are TJ, 4" short arm lift with custom arms, adjustable panhard and 35s. 168,000km.
Things I have tried so far:
-Rotated tires twice.
-Replaced the panhard bush twice once with a new poly, once a new rubber bush. Hole on axle bracket is tight. no play. Bolt tight fit in bush and torqued corectly.
-Replaced the fairly new panhard tie rod end with a new one. Hole on chassis bracket is round and def not ovalled. torqued to spec.
-Swapped my fairly new timken wheel bearings with ones i ran a while ago without problems and even bought one new one to see if it would make a difference. Axle nut torqued to spec.
- Lower control arm bushes are GQ patrol rubber bushes and appear in good cond./tight and don't have that many kms on them.
-Upper control arm bushes are factory ones with fairly low ks and appear quite good. I replaced one bush on the axle side and found the upper control arm/axle mount bolts had some play in the bush sleeve so i replaced the bolts with larger diameter ones that fit snug.
-Replaced tie rod and draglink/pitman arm tie rod ends with new Moog ones.
-Ball joints were replaced maybe 5-10,000km ago with new spicer ones and appear tight.
-Wheel bearing/ knuckle bolts are tight.
None of these has even made a slight difference!!
The only things left that I can think are:
- the draglink/knuckle tie rod that is non replaceable on the factory draglink but I have tested it several times and it appears tight. AFAIK this would require a custom draglink or modification unless someone is now making rhd draglinks for tjs?
-The other thing I'm not sure about is the steering box. Steering maybe feels slightly looser than I remember? so I tried adjusting the box slightly but no difference. There is a tiny bit of play at the input of the steering box but its not much and I wouldn't think play there would cause DW?
have your castor reading checked to see if it's within spec. I was having a few issues with mine at 5" & I had the castor set too low.
I think castor is slightly out but it has been like that for years with no more than a slight shimmy occasionally on some bumps at high speed. Now any bump at 60km/h results in full DW so I feel something must have some play?
I will try to adjust it slightly and see if it makes a difference though.
Thanks.
Do you have a steering stabiliser? if so, take it off and give that a try. Also, how old are your shockies?, i have heard in one case that an old one that was worn out and wasn't valving properly caused DW too, just a couple of ideas and hope you sort it out.
Put a different set of tyres on, and test drive.
Have a look out the window next time it DW's, anything that you have replaced is getting hammered everytime it wobbles.Wear is accelerated greatly under DW conditions.
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It doesn't matter how big a problem you have with your Jeep,it's nothing that money can't fix.
shocks are often overlooked and if a wobble is generated after hitting a bump then I would consider replacing them
I dont run 35's or have a 4" lift, but with mine I was getting a shimmy after hitting a bump. after proving everything was tight ended up fitting a set of OME nitros a couple of years back all good since
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05 six speed khaki renegade I like a man who grins when he fights—
Winston Churchill
I know you have probably done this. But have you had your head under the front of it while someone cycles the steering with the wheels on the ground? I have checked everything before, all was tight and correct, but soon as I looked at the front end when someone cycled the steering, the track bar at the frame end had play that I couldn't feel/move with a spanner/pry bar when checking.
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Incurable Death Wobble
