Anyone running a rough country 6.5" x-series lift

[toddsr]

I am running an x-series 6.5" lift from rough country and I can not get rid of death wobble. I have had several different opinions as to what I need to do but the opinions are from people who have never run this lift. I would like for someone who runs this lift to tell me what they did to git rid of or how to prevent death wobble. I have a set of drop brackets I am going to try monday but I don't know where to set my control arms and rough country doesn't know either. Any help with this matter would be greatly appreciated. I also had the front end lined up and I still had death wobble.

 

[CAJJ93XJ]

uhm. have you checked your steering

 

[whitexj98]

Lift brand does not matter, drop brackets will not fix death wobble but will ride better. There is a chart on the interweb for what to set control arm length to with drop brackets.

Regardless you need to do a front end inspection to figure out where the slop is giving you DW....

 

[mcguyver_xj]

!!!1 park jeep on flat dry pavement/ concrete have buddy turn steering wheel back and forth while you lay on your side and look and feel EVERYTHING...and get an alignment

 

[toddsr]

I am checking to see if anything is loose in the front and I'm going to get an alignment next week. I'll let you all know if I get it fixed. Thanks for everyone's input.

 

[TacoJohn]

I hate to even say this. . . I have the rough country 4.5" so not the same lift- although they are very similar. it doesn't look like it comes with a new steering damper. I would go get one of those if you are still running the stock one. second, I would check that the bottom hole on the Track bar is not wallored out, and that the bolt attaching the track bar to the axle is pretty tight. and on the steering damper if it does fix the death wobble, know that it just masked the symptoms of worn out front end components. . . good luck. had a death wobble myself. I have to admit, I am curious as to what the drop brackets might accomplish as far as improving the death wobble, I thought that they only corrected geometry and ride comfort issues. . .

 

[ROBZ95Xj]

I hate to even say this. . . I have the rough country 4.5" so not the same lift- although they are very similar. it doesn't look like it comes with a new steering damper. I would go get one of those if you are still running the stock one. second, I would check that the bottom hole on the Track bar is not wallored out, and that the bolt attaching the track bar to the axle is pretty tight. and on the steering damper if it does fix the death wobble, know that it just masked the symptoms of worn out front end components. . . good luck. had a death wobble myself. I have to admit, I am curious as to what the drop brackets might accomplish as far as improving the death wobble, I thought that they only corrected geometry and ride comfort issues. . .

1st, a bad steering damper WILL NOT cause dw, and a good one will only hide it. 2nd drop brackets will help with caster wich plays a part with dw in some cases

 

[DeftwillP]

I hate to even say this. . . I have the rough country 4.5" so not the same lift- although they are very similar. it doesn't look like it comes with a new steering damper. I would go get one of those if you are still running the stock one. second, I would check that the bottom hole on the Track bar is not wallored out, and that the bolt attaching the track bar to the axle is pretty tight. and on the steering damper if it does fix the death wobble, know that it just masked the symptoms of worn out front end components. . . good luck. had a death wobble myself. I have to admit, I am curious as to what the drop brackets might accomplish as far as improving the death wobble, I thought that they only corrected geometry and ride comfort issues. . .

Haha nope.

OP, what's your caster?

 

[xpedition xj-eh!]

I have a set of drop brackets I am going to try monday but I don't know where to set my control arms and rough country doesn't know either.

The control arm lengths are specified in their instructions.

See here

Lift Height: 4.5"
Lower Control Arm: 15.75" - Stock Length
Upper Control Arm: 15 - Stock Length

Lift Height: 6"
Lower Control Arm: 15.875"
Upper Control Arm: 15.125"

Lift Height: 8"
Lower Control Arm: 16.25"
Upper Control Arm: 15.524"

 

[xpedition xj-eh!]

If after you check all your joints and the usual death wobble causes you still can't find the problem, check your tires. I've had to deal with death wobble twice. Both were caused by different problems.

First time: bad u-joint. This was easy to find because it was clicking and doing weird things when turning sometime before the death wobble started becoming a problem.

Second time: Cupped tires. This took me FOREVER to figure out and before I did, I replaced and checked a lot of things. As it turned out, my tires wore some flat spots on the inside surface. I couldn't see any unusual tire wear, but I could feel it by running my hand along the inner-most surface of my tires. You can try putting your rear tires on the front and see if it makes any difference in your death wobble. In my case all four tires were cupped so that didn't help. Putting different tires on solved the problem. The death wobble I had from bad tires was pretty violent starting at around 95km's / hour ( 55 miles per hour or so ).'

Edit: I've driven without a steering damper and not had death wobble. So as was mentioned above, steering dampers should not be used to solve/mask death wobble issues.
Edit2: I run the 4.5" X-Series Rough Country lift with drop brackets. But as was said above, the lift kit doesn't really matter in determining the cause of death wobble.

 

[kc_eiland]

I would check that the bottom hole on the Track bar is not wallored out, and that the bolt attaching the track bar to the axle is pretty tight.

X2 on this... I recently fixed my DW problem. I found that the trackbar bolt (axle side) would move left and right when my buddy moved the wheels left and right. The bolt hole on the trackbar axle mount was wallowed out.

I fixed this by drilling the (what used to be) 1/2" hole to 5/8"... then drilling the trackbar hole to 5/8" as well. Got some Grade 8 hardware (5/8" bolt, 2 washers, and nut) as well as a new sleeve for the trackbar end so the new 5/8" bolt would fit it.

Re-connected trackbar and zero DW to date. I also swapped my steering to the IRO OTK kit... but I doubt that played a role in fixing my DW problems.

Hope this helps.