What are you doing to your rig - the continuing saga

[jimgrms]

D W in my 2 jeeps were fixed by a quality alignment ' not a driveway tape measure one

 

[Digger87xj]

I guess I am confused. If you require a ram to fix death wobble you aren't fixing shit. You are covering it up with the ram. No different than people with dual dampners.
If it can't cruise down road with no dampner or ram without issue you have a problem. Tossing one of those on does not fix the problem.

"An assist ram holds the cross tie rod rock solid so DW can't start."

While it might "hold" the tie rod, your head is still in the wrong place. You're approaching it completely wrong. Unless you fix it WITHOUT the assist on there, your assist has just become a "band-aid" to once again...try and mask the problem.

Believe me when I say suspension actions and geometry as something I'm very, very familiar with.

A damper is a band-aid that *might* mask it. A dampener is in not supposed to be there absorb harmonics per se, that was not the true engineering reason for it. The more "true" engineering reason behind the steering damper (which is actually a bad name for it ) was to give the steering a "stiffer" response. You can take a steering damper off, and if your steering is correct...should not be one bit different. I ran without a damper with my crossover when I had it and much preferred it.

If you do NOT fix your issue BEFORE you put the assist on there, you're going to move stress/strain of parts to areas you do not want.

There are many a person on here who will tell you the same thing. I struggled with DW for a while on mine, until I got it all figured out...and it had nothing to do with any of my setups.

OK.. Y'all have that discussion with Crawlertech.. they couldn't come up for the DW fix for the previous owner of this jeep either.
ALL new steering parts, heavier DOM tie rods, top of the line hiems, OTK steering arms, ball joints, track bar... Talking with people till I'm blue in the face. Letting people that are supposed to be more experienced or 'qualified' than me inspect the set-up.. more research than I can even begin to relate to you... all with the same answer; "You got me..."

Band-aid? hardly. It is a viable, and (edit out;usually) most likely a permanent fix, and no one on an internet forum will lead be to believe it is not. When something solves a problem 100% how is that a band aid?

If I had unlimited funds to swap rim/tire combos, knuckles, different brands this and that until I found the right combo to eliminate it.. I might.
Fact of the matter is I don't, and after exhausting all other avenues of possibilities, a ram is now going on, along with it's other obvious offroad benefits that come with it.


I really hate DW discussions ... everyone has their high horse opinion, experience, hard line thoughts and parroting what they read on other forums on the matter. And in the end, what fixes one vehicle doesn't fix the another.

**** it Dude, lets go bowling.

 

[Digger87xj]

oh and BTW.. the experience factor is there... I have wrenches I've bought that are older than many of the people on here, so please don't assume what experience I may have or not.

 

[old_man]

OK.. Y'all have that discussion with Crawlertech.. they couldn't come up for the DW fix for the previous owner of this jeep either.
ALL new steering parts, heavier DOM tie rods, top of the line hiems, OTK steering arms, ball joints, track bar... Talking with people till I'm blue in the face. Letting people that are supposed to be more experienced or 'qualified' than me inspect the set-up.. more research than I can even begin to relate to you... all with the same answer; "You got me..."

Band-aid? hardly. It is a viable, and usually permanent fix, and no one on an internet forum will lead be to believe it is not. When something solves a problem 100% how is that a band aid?

If I had unlimited funds to swap rim/tire combos, knuckles, different brands this and that until I found the right combo to eliminate it.. I might.
Fact of the matter is I don't, and after exhausting all other avenues of possibilities, a ram is now going on, along with it's other obvious offroad benefits that come with it.


I really hate DW discussions ... everyone has their high horse opinion, experience, hard line thoughts and parroting what they read on other forums on the matter. And in the end, what fixes one vehicle doesn't fix the another.

**** it Dude, lets go bowling.

If you can wait a month until I am back in town, I would be happy to take a look at it for you. I have solved more DW problems than you can count on your fingers.

For information, the damper is really more to keep the shock from hitting things like curbs and such from being felt so severely on the steering wheel. It may stop the DW but it does not fix the underlying problem that will most likely come back at a later time.

 

[Digger87xj]

If you can wait a month until I am back in town, I would be happy to take a look at it for you. I have solved more DW problems than you can count on your fingers.

For information, the damper is really more to keep the shock from hitting things like curbs and such from being felt so severely on the steering wheel. It may stop the DW but it does not fix the underlying problem that will most likely come back at a later time.

Thanks for the offer.

This is the only one I have not been able to fix, and it is my own...luckily, or rather, ironically. DW and overheating have plagued this jeep before I got a hold of it and both problems remain after emptying my pockets on parts and good advice of others.

At any rate, I want the ram on there for it's other benefits, DW or no, so, If I have DW after the install I'll come see you... can't hurt. :thumbup:

 

[DutchVDub]

I've been holding off comment so I'm glad other spoke up.

A hydraulic ram, steering stabilizers, etc do not fix death wobble in any way. All they do is mask it. A good example from my own experience: my first Jeep was a 1998 XJ I bought in Aug 2007 after returning from Iraq. A few months later I installed a Rusty's 4.5" short a kit with their adjustable trac-bar. I installed it at the car craft center on Fort Carson. Drove it home with no problems but a few days later started getting very bad death wobble. I'm talking true death wobble where the only way to stop it was by pulling over and coming to a complete stop.

Not having time to really go through the Jeep I bought an "upgraded" steering stabilizer and was then able to drive out to Omaha, NE for thanksgiving without any wobble issues.

While in NE I hit a set of rail road tracks at 55mph (county highway) and then lost most steering ability and had serious wobbles. My trac-bar had broken.

I limped the Jeep back to my Mom's house and used here car to get a new TRE for the trac-bar. I then found the GO-Jeep website and followed the instructions for an as accurate as possible driveway alignment, including checking caster. Once I had gone through it and loosened/re-torqued all my suspension bolts I was able to drive home without the steering stabilizer installed. Since then I never run one until I have verified there no wobbles or issues first. The steering stabilizer is only there to cushion bump steer, but it also hides other issues.

This is a great write up on going through a JK's steering/suspension and can be applied to the XJ as well.

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

 

[in4aride]

I am not saying you are experienced or not. Nor am I talking about anyone else. From a strictly 'elbow is connect to this bone, this bone connected to..' Basis, the vehicle should not need anything to drive without dw. Plain and simple hard fact. It might not be able to do that. I understand problem no one can figure out but there are endless possibilities to be causing it. Frame can be bent in the back causing a slight twist of everything up front. The hole could be 1/64 too big on any of steerin components. Bolt might have been worn down or grooved. Endless.

But saying bolting up a ram is a fix is horseshit. That's a salesman pitch. It'll work no doubt. But you didn't correct the underlying problem.

 

[freerider15]

OK.. Y'all have that discussion with Crawlertech.. they couldn't come up for the DW fix for the previous owner of this jeep either.
ALL new steering parts, heavier DOM tie rods, top of the line hiems, OTK steering arms, ball joints, track bar... Talking with people till I'm blue in the face. Letting people that are supposed to be more experienced or 'qualified' than me inspect the set-up.. more research than I can even begin to relate to you... all with the same answer; "You got me..."

Band-aid? hardly. It is a viable, and (edit out;usually) most likely a permanent fix, and no one on an internet forum will lead be to believe it is not. When something solves a problem 100% how is that a band aid?

If I had unlimited funds to swap rim/tire combos, knuckles, different brands this and that until I found the right combo to eliminate it.. I might.
Fact of the matter is I don't, and after exhausting all other avenues of possibilities, a ram is now going on, along with it's other obvious offroad benefits that come with it.


I really hate DW discussions ... everyone has their high horse opinion, experience, hard line thoughts and parroting what they read on other forums on the matter. And in the end, what fixes one vehicle doesn't fix the another.

**** it Dude, lets go bowling.

Please don't think I'm trying to rag on you at all, I'm really trying to help as I had DW worse than most here will ever have to feel...it ripped by trackbar bracket and half my coil bucket off on my way from Moab at 1AM in the morning going on the off ramp from I-76 to I-25. Nothing like having to use ratchet straps to hold your front end together and drive so slow that it takes you 2.5 hours to get form Denver to Fort Collins.

As far as CrawlerTech, I know Josh...and he knows his sh*t. I'll be doing some serious wheeling with him once the buggy gets wrapped up. DW is one of those that is such a menace at tracking down. There are so many variables at play that just a few of them being slightly off can cause mayhem.

"When something solves a problem 100% how is that a band aid?"

What your not seeing is stress transfer. The reason it might feel like it is a 100% fix is that since it is a hydraulic system, you have more "force" over how the steering moves. The main difference is that it still WANTS to DW, your just able to "hold" more force with the hydraulics. Problem is, the fact that it still want to DW many times causes the stress to head elsewhere...in many cases that being the frame.

If I were able to I'd be more than willing to lend a helping hand when Tom takes a look at it too.

Mine took a long time to figure out due to it not being easy to see at all. What I found on mine is that the several different "layers" spot welded together under/near the trackbar mount started to separate. I didn't see it because the trackbar bracket hid it. Plating the frame round the trackbar would have been the only cure (I found stress cracks and tears in the frame under the trackbar bracket as well).

In essence, the assist might help "cure" it, but it does not "fix" it.

 

[Digger87xj]

yup.. btdt. crawled all over pirate, this site that site, and many others that I cant remember.

Been a professional wrench for 27 years... I've no lack of understanding or experience on steering and suspension diagnostics and repair, and until this monster, I've had no problem locating the failure point.

The DW is extremely random, and there is only one spot that I have found, at a specific speed and turning arc that will ~80% of the time set it off...that spot I described above.
When it does start happening more often, I can find a cause.. most often the tire has been knocked out of balance. Other times I've found a hiem has worn or BJ loose, steering box worn out (again) ... all commonplace with lifts and mods of the sorts we put on our rigs.

Everything that I have fixed or changed so far has helped immensely over what it drove like when I first got it, but the DW monster that lies within lurks just under the surface and won't die.

All I'm shooting for now is a mod that will let me run this thing without being concerned that it will hop into DW if I happen to knock a weight off while I'm out wheeling.

 

[Digger87xj]

Please don't think I'm trying to rag on you at all, I'm really trying to help as I had DW worse than most here will ever have to feel...it ripped by trackbar bracket and half my coil bucket off on my way from Moab at 1AM in the morning going on the off ramp from I-76 to I-25. Nothing like having to use ratchet straps to hold your front end together and drive so slow that it takes you 2.5 hours to get form Denver to Fort Collins.

As far as CrawlerTech, I know Josh...and he knows his sh*t. I'll be doing some serious wheeling with him once the buggy gets wrapped up. DW is one of those that is such a menace at tracking down. There are so many variables at play that just a few of them being slightly off can cause mayhem.

"When something solves a problem 100% how is that a band aid?"

What your not seeing is stress transfer. The reason it might feel like it is a 100% fix is that since it is a hydraulic system, you have more "force" over how the steering moves. The main difference is that it still WANTS to DW, your just able to "hold" more force with the hydraulics. Problem is, the fact that it still want to DW many times causes the stress to head elsewhere...in many cases that being the frame.

If I were able to I'd be more than willing to lend a helping hand when Tom takes a look at it too.

Mine took a long time to figure out due to it not being easy to see at all. What I found on mine is that the several different "layers" spot welded together under/near the trackbar mount started to separate. I didn't see it because the trackbar bracket hid it. Plating the frame round the trackbar would have been the only cure (I found stress cracks and tears in the frame under the trackbar bracket as well).

In essence, the assist might help "cure" it, but it does not "fix" it.

Noted and respected :thumbup:

 

[Digger87xj]

What your not seeing is stress transfer. The reason it might feel like it is a 100% fix is that since it is a hydraulic system, you have more "force" over how the steering moves. The main difference is that it still WANTS to DW, your just able to "hold" more force with the hydraulics. Problem is, the fact that it still want to DW many times causes the stress to head elsewhere...in many cases that being the frame

If DW can't start, then the stresses are not there. I get that all of our mods, and oversize tires are not what this 'frame' was designed for, else we wouldn't have the need for steering box braces, frame stiffeners, blah blah blah. Are they viable fixes or just band-aids that cover up an underlying problem?

If I have other hidden internal frame problems, and my death wobble is stemming from my track bar, wherein the whole axle is flopping and not just the tires, I should find out pretty soon that the ram didn't help.

If the ram is able to hold the cross tie-rod from transferring an unbalanced wobble from one tire to the other, preventing the start of death wobble, why then is it seen as a bandaid and not a fix?

 

[in4aride]

Because a non existin ram is not at fault for the problem. The tire was. Fixing the tire would be a fix. Putting on a ram to mask the problem the tire is creating not.

I am more interested with the 'on a specific arc' thing. To me this point to steering geometry, suspension, and what is happening with alignment in the turn.

 

[Digger87xj]

Right.. the tire was the cause. If I had 29" tires, there wouldn't be enough mass to progress into DW.

I agree, there is something happening during a slight right turn at a specific speed that I can feel a slight wobble start in the steering wheel. Most times there is nothing more and it corrects on it's own. If I am over 55mph..or under 45, or in a left turn, the wobble is never there.

 

[Digger87xj]

For a need to know....
This is a full width, trussed D44, OTK crossover steering. 1.5" .250" wall tie rods & track bar, chromo-whatever hiems at the knuckles and 1/2 ton tie-rod end at the box.

 

[in4aride]

Ok but if there would have been movement at 29" vs say 35's the problem is likely not the tire. It's likely some other part you've changed a million times already. It just shows up since the tire shows more effect now.

 

[Fred]

I replaced the passenger side mirror on the 90 that I tore off on Liberty with one from a late model.



Something here is not like the other. LOL. Didn't Disney have a donkey character that had one ear up and on ear down? That's what the heep reminds me of. But really, I added the other side because the new mirrors are so much better.



I made a switch box, and stuck on the dash, using the roll cage to run the wiring.

 

[DutchVDub]

Just ordered this sweet little jacket

http://www.aceengineeringandfab.com/ACE-Lava-Jacket_p_89.html

It hooks to the heater vent on the JK so you actually get heat or a/c when the doors are off. I'm going to look kind of funny in the summer wearing a jacket, but it'll be awesome.

 

[kastein]

On the subject of dw, which I have ranted about at length... the whole thing is very similar to a fairly complex damped rlc (probably with more than one r, l, and c) circuit. That is why changing the weight of the tires can change dw, it makes the system either stay away from the resonant frequency or pushes the resonant frequency into the range it will see. A pothole or expansion joint is your heaviside step function or sinc() pulse, if the suspension is underdamped at any frequency it sees, oscillations will begin when it is "pumped" with the impulse.

I had DW so bad in my comanche that the passenger motor mount tore off the side of the block. Snapped two bolt heads off and ripped the cast iron boss for the third out of the block entirely. This on a 100% stock vehicle.

When I swapped the engine (and trans, and added a tcase) I also lifted it, locked the front diff, put worn unbalanced 33s on it, and didn't align it or replace the shocks or change any bushings or control arms.

DW was gone. It stayed gone for two years even after swapping lots of parts. I haven't found where it is coming from now, but it is so haggard these days I am probably going to just tear it all out at once and fix it.

However, I have developed a sixth sense for deathwobble and can quite literally kill it in its tracks with throttle modulation and a quick flick of the wheel, without ever touching the brakes. Which is a good thing, because if I enter a sweeping left turn going over 40mph, or have to travel straight on the right side of a steeply crowned road, it tries repeatedly to go into fullblown wobble unless I flick the wheel very slightly every half second or so. If it does manage to start due to me being inattentive, I can again kill it dead by carefully timing my move to coincide with it wobbling the right way, then abruptly whipping the wheel a half turn to the left and right back before the vehicle can actually respond. Which is every bit as worrying to passengers as it sounds...

So yeah, basically, it is a deathtrap for anyone but me, and only slightly less of a deathtrap for me. Hasn't been driven in 4 months because of this.

 

[in4aride]

On a serious note. Any of you home doers looking for a project of stupid but consuming shat on a xj once parts are appropriated??
Things such as (front fenders, trim rear, door swap -likely all 4- )
And that's about it til paint then trans swap.

 

[Hypoid]

Time to fondle my new parts from Serious Offroad...