death wobble

[kirkandsylvia]

Ok....so, enjoying driving the xj again, but of course, nothing could be perfect. What causes the infamous "death wobble"? It does it at 65-75 when crossing over passes where the asphalt meets the concrete (the small little step transition). It plays hell trying to get slowed down to get front end toned down. Is there a specific cause to this, or is there multiple possibilities that cause this?

[Ol Man]

Multiple: Ball joints. Tie rods. Track bar. Toe-in and toe-out. Drag link. Steering box. Steering stabilizer. Wheel bearings. Pretty much anything that moves or controls movement in the front end. Put it up on jack stands and work and watch all of the above. Bet it will be obvious, not like your previous issue.

[kirkandsylvia]

Yeah...lets not go there with the previous issue. Thanks for the info. Hope this doesnt take 3 yrs to sort it out

[6spdYJ]

Also take a look at the tapered holes on the knuckles & the pitman arm. They can get wollared out too.

[kirkandsylvia]

Ok..thanks. I had a feeling this was more involved than I thought.

[Materdaddy]

Tire balance is yet another one I didn't see on the list. Tons of things it could be. Luckily I've only had to deal with it once. My problems were steering stabilizer, wollowed out track bar frame mount and out of balance tire. Replaced the stabilizer, Dukes (Chris) helped me with the track bar frame mount, and I rotated tires and put the out of balance one on the rear.

I no longer own that Jeep, and among my steering issues with the Jeep I have now, luckily death wobble isn't one of them!

[kirkandsylvia]

I'm thinking after looking at mine, for starts, new tires as these ones are shot and thinking out of balance. The stabilizer is wet around the shaft seal...thinking its shot. Tie rod ends looked good, trac bar looked ok as far the frame mount and Heim joint. Other end seemed tight around bushing...at least it wasn't flopping around. I think I'm starting with tires and stabilizer first and see how that pans out.

[Jason]

I vote for checking the balance on the tires, if they are still good. Start on the least expensive. Your jeep sat for years.

[screwball]

Disagree sorta. My Procomp MT 315's that I purchased from NWOODS years ago are pretty chunked, plus they're outta round. I can do 0 to 75 without issue.

To be fair, I mostly run around on newer BFG all terrain and only swap tires if playing on rocks.


After upgrading to Currie upper & lower arms, including (Weld-on) Currie frontend housing kit (Installed by MrBlaine) not even a shimmy.

As a side note... I do my own alignments.

[daniel_buck]

did you check the ball joints?

[xthread]

Just changed out my upper and lower balljoints as they were the last part of the puzzle .what a difference .it drives sweeeeet now .very happy .bottoms were wasted .just turned 100, 000 miles.

[kirkandsylvia]

I'm going to start with tires...they are pretty shot and due for some new shoes. Hopefully that cures it.

[daniel_buck]

it's real easy to check the ball joints. Just jack one of the front wheels off the ground, squat down infront of the wheel like you were going to look at the lug nuts, now grab the top and bottom of the tire and try to wiggle the wheel. Push the top of the wheel away from you, bottom of the wheel towards you, then back and forth real hard. There should be zero wiggling. If there is wiggling, you'll feel it. In bad cases, you can actually see the movement against the knuckle. Then try the other side.

I check mine almost every time I rotate the tires.