- Location
- Mobile, AL
I have never had the pleasure of owning, driving, or riding in a vehicle that was afflicted with death wobble until yesterday. Maybe I am lucky?? Well a friend of mine has a '03 TJ. We put half (suspension part, waiting to do the body lift) of the 2.5" DPG Ultimate TJ lift on the weekend before Thanksgiving. I tried to talk him out of it, but the next day he decided to drive from GA to NH to be with his family for the holidays. I totally understand that he wanted to visit them but I hated the fact that he was going to drive the TJ we had just lifted. All the suspension lift consists of is new coils f&r, JKS adj. track bar F&R, jks quicker discos front and extended sway bar links rear. Nothing to warrant too much concern, but I know from experience that you never want to go too far away with out checking your work after driving it 100 miles. He made it to NH just fine, and said he checked everything with the eye test before driving back. At about 200 miles short of his destination, he hit a bump in the road driving about 75mph and DW from hell. He had to have had to change his pants after that... He pulled over to the side of the interstate and looked everything over and said it looked good. Started to drive again, and About 10 more miles down the road it happened again, but this time was 10X worse. At least he was smart enough to be driving slower. He again pulled over and found that the upper track bar bolt was missing. Only then did I get a call. Lucky for him, at least I thought at the time, he had the components for the body lift with him in the TJ. I told him to take one of the bolts for the body lift and see if it would fit through the holes in the track bar and mount. It was a little too thin, but perfect length. The only problem was that he did not have a nut for the bolt. He called the SC hwy patrol, a trooper picked him up, took him to a truck stop near by, and he actually found a nut to fit the bolt from some trucker at the truck stop. He called me back and I advised him that this would not be a solid fix and if he was going to try to limp home he was going to have to go SLOW and avoid harsh movements of the steering wheel. 20 miles down the road the bolt either broke or nut fell off the track bar again. He had it towed 150 miles home. The Monday after thanksgiving, he called JKS and ordered another bolt for the track bar. For some reason or another, JKS decided against grease fitting on the track bar itself, hollowed out the bolt, and put grease fitting on the end of it. I love JKS products but this blew my mind. Maybe they know something I don’t. We reattached the track bar, and I finally got to experience DW.
This is not bump related or turn related. Straight line from 50 to 55mph wobble, wobble. Above that (yes I am crazy) it goes away. We purchased a new steering dampener (his was toast) and installed it. I told him the DW probably killed his OE dampener, and sure enough, the DW is still there but very subtle. You hit 50mph and you can feel a shimmy, but at least now it is drivable, until the dampener goes out that is.
Not really looking for advice, unless someone out there has a no shit fix, and I am sure that is not the case. We have a check list as long as my arm we are going to start on tomorrow. Just thought I would share my, and his, experience.
This is not bump related or turn related. Straight line from 50 to 55mph wobble, wobble. Above that (yes I am crazy) it goes away. We purchased a new steering dampener (his was toast) and installed it. I told him the DW probably killed his OE dampener, and sure enough, the DW is still there but very subtle. You hit 50mph and you can feel a shimmy, but at least now it is drivable, until the dampener goes out that is.
Not really looking for advice, unless someone out there has a no shit fix, and I am sure that is not the case. We have a check list as long as my arm we are going to start on tomorrow. Just thought I would share my, and his, experience.