Can toasted motor mounts cause death wobble?

Question says it all. My bushings are shot and i have death wobble.

Not from my experience. Death wabble usually is cause by not having enough caster.

NO. :nono:

There are a lot more causes than not having enough caster.

Motor mounts can contribute to a DW situation, but normally will not cause it. Anything that can store and then release energy can add to the problem, including motor mounts. First things first. Did it ever drive OK with this exact suspension configuration? If so, then something either wore out or got loose.

The easiest way to diagnose things is to get a helper to get inside and rock the wheel back and forth. Look closesly at each and every joint. Look for slop, allowing movement. It is possible that the caster is off, and that good shocks and stabilizers were hiding the problem, but not normally.

Well i didn't want to start another "Help...solve my death wobble thread" but here goes. My death wobble only started immediately after i put fix-a-flat in one of my tires to fix a small leak (i know, i know). Since then i've had that tire fixed and rebalanced and moved to the back. Ever since i've had the wobble; the is no visible play when looking under the jeep and steering the wheel. I've had multiple alignments and have a new HD tierod. I'm starting to think even though you can't see it, that the heim on the end of my RE trackbar has had its day. Seems like the wobble is set off violently by bumps and by steering slightly in either direction on the highway (this is why i think it is the trackbar).

All death wobble threads suck without alignment specs and a description of your front suspension; tire size & condition, wheel offset, lift height, steering and suspension mods, condition of bushings and TRE's, etc. These are things that affect DW so they need to be on the table for an intelligent discussion.

Of course it will still come down to something is loose and you just haven't found it yet.

MaXJohnson said:

Of course it will still come down to something is loose and you just haven't found it yet.

Click to expand...

Unless it comes down to wheel balance, which is where I always start. I notice in your narrative you did not mention balacing the rear tires when you moved them to the front.

The only case of true DW I have experienced came in an almost new 1999 Grand Cherokee with about 10,000 to 11,000 miles on it. It had never been off road. Happened on a long downgrade on a smooth state highway when I touched the brakes lightly to bleed offf speed. This wa a NEW vehicle, at the time about 6 months old. All components were tight. Tire balance was marginal -- no real shake or shimmy, but at around 55 to 60 I could sort of feel "something."

What triggered it for me, I think, was the famous WJ warped brake rotors. That coupled with tires that were borderline for balance was enough. Oddly enough, it had never done it before and it never did it again. I think the light touch on the brakes allowed the calipers to get knocked back and forth, initiating the oscillation pattern. If I had really stomped on the brakes, the calipers would have locked down on the rotors and the result would have been less ...ah ... "dramatic."