HELP! Deathwobble on stock XJ

My wifes 00XJ has HORRIBLE deathwobble. It happens almost dead on at 50 mph. If you run it up to 55, then back off, soon as it hits 52-50 it starts. If you keep it at 50, it continues to get worse and so bad it even scarred me. Almost to the point of losing control. Other times you do the same thing, and it wont shimmy at all. I'd say 4 out of 5 times, it had deathwobble.

I have changed the front drivers axle U joint because it was toast. I changed the sway bar bushings because they looked like it was slipping. No I am lost. NOTHING else in the front looks bad. Anything that was questionable, I checked against my XJ and they seemed the same (ball joint looseness, etc)

Could it be a tire out of balance? I have tired 3 different tires on the front, swapping them around and no difference. Could it be something inthe rear end? This is a completely stock XJ. It had a little wobble around 50 for a week or two, then it turned into this.

Please help!

There are a lot of threads on death wobble, even on stock XJs, you just gotta search harder.

Here's a list of stuff to check:

Tire Balance
Alignment
Balljoints (jack up one side at a time and pry under tire and watch balljoint)
Steering Components (have someone move steering wheel, or jack up front end and bang around with a rubber mallet, check for play)
Unit Hub Bearings (jack up one side at a time, grab at 12 and 6 and try to pull in and out, and wiggle, also, slowly spin tire and listen for a clicking sound coming from the bearings)
Loose Lug Nuts
Track Bar (make sure there is no play, drop frame end and check the joint for play)
Control Arm Bushings

HTH
Jeff

one other thing to check is also your steering dampner.

Have the tires professionally inspected and balanced by a good technician.

Oh yeah, and don't wait on this. True DW could end up making you actually dead. When it happened to me, the SUV in the lane next to me laid on the brakes. I s... myself and then laughed when it stopped. Parked it at home and took the wheels to the shop for new tires. Yes, it scared me so bad, I would not drive it. It turned out to be 2 tires with slipped belts. Not even a shimmy now and not another thing has been changed.

I kept her stock wheels and tires from her old XJ when it got wrecked. I threw them on and took it for a ride. All seems good now!

My buddy, used to work for Discount for 4-5 years. He looked over the tires and found that 2 of them had broken belts.

Thanks guys!

Take a look at this thread:
http://www.jeepforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=262327

Steering dampner or ball joints

mine was the LCA bushings... changed them out and no more wobble had mine about 40mph all stock