death wobble

gonna have a week off soon and I have to find out what is up with my Jeep as it is about to be my DD again. has a nasty death wobble from 35 - 40 MPH. if i accelerate through it, the wobble will not occur. it only happens if i gradually accelerate or hold speed in the 35-40 mph range.

i have NO CLUE as to the workings of the front end and while i would love to have the time to read up on it all, i don't right now. I can explain turbo theory and troubleshooting but lifts diagnostics are out of my realm for now.

i will be off from the 20th - 29th of April. Hopefully I can get some help for a case of beer 'cause money is a bit tight too and i figure i will have to buy some parts to fix this...

post specs of your lift and components and steering components (stock, raised TB bracket, Adj TB, draglink flip?)

Give as much info as possible to help narrow it down "a little" cause there are waaaaaaay too many possibilities.

First thing to check is the track bar bolts.

Wheels / tires balanced?

Is it the "can't hold the steering wheel, pray out loud, hold on to the seat with your ass crack and hope you don't crash" kind of wobble or is it a solid shimmy in the steering wheel?

And read... slacker

http://www.jkowners.com/forum/showthread.php?t=30723

"Is it the "can't hold the steering wheel, pray out loud, hold on to the seat with your ass crack and hope you don't crash" kind of wobble or is it a solid shimmy in the steering wheel?"


Yeah this is me, as of late yesterday but only on left hand turns. Pretty sure mine is the bad shocks and leaky steering stabilizer. At least I hope so. Lol

Also read that the bolts for the steering box work loose. I haven't had this occure on the jeep but my old yota needed them tighten weekly

I had the wobbles bad for a while I change out some parts that where bad but it always came back it would happen to me when I hit a bump in the road at about 30 to 40 mph it turns out it was my tires the where balanced but when I hit a bump it would go crazy and all I wanted to do was hit a tree and buy a new jeep but I bought new tires and shazam no more wobbles the belt in one of the tires was separated sorry for the long story I'm board

Mr.RonGilbert wrote:

First thing to check is the track bar bolts.

Wheels / tires balanced?

Is it the "can't hold the steering wheel, pray out loud, hold on to the seat with your ass crack and hope you don't crash" kind of wobble or is it a solid shimmy in the steering wheel?

its the "can't hold the steering wheel, think a tire is gonna snap off if i don't speed up or slow down". had tires checked for balance at 4WP when the problem started. that was good. i can't remember what else they said. I do remember them telling me something like $500 for an alignment, so i think i just discounted whatever else they said. i admit i haven't helped my situation here - LOL


my lift is a rock krawler mid arm flex with bomb proof trac-bar..

http://rockkrawler.com/pages/catalog/index.php?r_itemID=117


this is what i think i remember 4 wheel parts saying something about (in red) and i bet it is because of what is in blue. i think it started shortly after i got stuck at the last off roading trip where the ledge gave way and i was stuck sideways with the weight on my front passenger tire...

Quote :

Next, look at the trackbar (aqua). It attaches to a bracket on the frame on the driver's side and to the axle on the passenger side. The purpose of the trackbar is to center the axle on the frame. With the axle centered on the frame, it provides some resistance to the steering system to allow you to turn. If there was no trackbar and you turned the steering, the whole front frame would shift. As a result, there is significant force applied to the trackbar in driving and steering.

Now, imagine that the bolts that hold the trackbar are loose in their bolt holes, or that the bolt holes are wallowed out (oval), or that the bushings at the trackbar ends are damaged, or that the bracket at the axle side has come loose because the weld has broken, or that the bushings are all twisted up because the rig has been lifted without the installer loosening the bolts and then retightened them at the new ride height. All these things would allow play in the front trackbar. When you steer or go around a corner, these loose or broken things would allow the axle to shake or slide side to side. If you hit a bump in the road, it could knock the trackbar towards the driver's side. Then, the rest of the suspension (springs, etc.) would try to bring the trackbar back to the passenger side. If you were going at any sort of speed, you could develop a kind of harmonic resonance as the axle more and more violently slide/rocked/shaked from side to side. It would feel like your whole front end was being voilently torn apart. You would have to bring your vehicle to a complete standstill to stop the harmonic resonance. This is Death Wobble.

Even one incident of violent Death Wobble related to the front trackbar can cause significant damage. The voilent harmonic resonance of the back and forth shaking is more than the trackbar bushings, bolt holes, and brackets are designed to handle. A severe Death Wobble occurance can crack or break the welds on the axle side trackbar bracket, or the bolt can wallow out the bolt hole in the bracket, or the bushing can be permanently damaged.

This is the most common source of Death Wobble because inexperienced installers either do not remove the bolt from the trackbar when they install a lift--leaving the bushing pinched in the bracket and bound up, or they do not properly torque the bolts after the lift has been installed with the tires on and the full weight of the vehicle on the ground at ride height, or (maybe the most common) they do not retorque the trackbar bolts after the first 50 miles, after every heavy wheeling trip, and at every oil change interval.

Next, look at the lower control arms (purple) and the upper control arms (light blue). In the picture, they are aftermarket arms with a heim joint on one end. However, the stock control arms have a rubber bushing at each end. When the control arms are properly torqued, the bushing is somewhat pinched in the mounting brackets on the axle and the frame. Sometimes, an installer will make the mistake of not loosening the bolts for the control arms when they install a lift. What happens sometimes is they really bind up the bushings because they are pinched/sandwiched at stock ride height, but then forced to the new lifted ride height. These bound up bushings can cause weird handling, bushing failure, and lead to Death Wobble. The proper way is to loosen the bolts, install the lift, reinstall the wheels so the suspension and jeep are at the new ride height, rock the vehicle/suspension back and forth and side to side, then re-torque the bolts to spec, then after 50 miles re-torque them to spec, then after every oil change or very heavy wheeling trip re-torque them to spec.

Mr.RonGilbert wrote:

And read... slacker

http://www.jkowners.com/forum/showthread.php?t=30723

THANKS!!!! good shit right here!

Mr.RonGilbert wrote:

First thing to check is the track bar bolts.

Wheels / tires balanced?

Is it the "can't hold the steering wheel, pray out loud, hold on to the seat with your ass crack and hope you don't crash" kind of wobble or is it a solid shimmy in the steering wheel?

That made my Friday, Ron!!


Fred, you've got a pretty complete lift. The only thing missing is a Rear Adj TB (unless the Rr TB Bracket also centers the rear axle) and a Drag Link flip + front TB Bracket. But the missing components would not cause death wobble.

Like RG said, check ALL your suspension bolts, esp TB bolts. Forget factory torque specs and tighten the living $H!T out of all your bolts. I found this works well. Check your control arm & TB joints/bushings for slop. & Like RG said, check for wollowed out bolt holes for the TB.

I had a ovaled (sp?) out hole where my trackbar bolts were, you can weld in some washers or replace the mount. I upgraded all the bolts to Grade 8 and torqued the peewaddling fuck out of them - I torqued them to spec and still had wobble.. then got a big ass cheater and tightened them some more - no more wobble and no more problems. I also painted the threads with some red nail polish so I can glance down to see if they have backed off. It's been about 9 months and life is still good.