ducatijosh
Well-Known Member
- Thread starter
- #1
Hello,
I got an interesting issue I’ve been tracking for awhile. I have a 2022 Jeep Wrangler High Tide that I had a shop put a 2.5” Clayton Ride Right+ kit on with Fox 2.0 shocks. Caster was set to 6.5 degrees
The kit includes 4 springs, sway bar endlinks, both track bars and front upper control arms to fix caster angle (upper not lower like most kits)
I ran it like this for a bit with the stock BFG KO2 35” tires and the first time it was cold out I got DW coming across an expansion joint on a highway, about 40 degrees out, this happened 2-3 more times within about 10 minutes and I pulled over at a Lowe’s grabbed a torque wrench and socket and tightened the track bar to 130ft lbs, it seemed to be just shy of this as it moved some but not much.
I took it back to the shop and they messed with it for a bit swapping out random parts with ones they had and determined it was the steering stabilizer (….BS), the factory one had a dead spot in it and they said the air in there might have been freezing. I replaced it with a Fox 2.0 through shaft stabilizer as I was looking for a stiffer wheel feeling anyway but spring came and we never had another issue.
Since then I’ve replaced the wheels and tires with Method 703’s and BFG KO2 37” load Cs, we had death wobble again about a month ago when it was around 30 degrees outside, I noticed a bit of play in the drag link at the pitman arm where it was clicking so I swapped that out for a Steer Smarts drag link (tie rod still in a box in the garage, will get to that later). The steering felt much stiffer after that but today I took it out at around 11 degrees outside and got DW again when hitting a gravel filled pot hole with only the driver side.
After this I immediately went back out with my 2022 Jeep Gladiator that has the full Clayton 2.5” Overland Plus kit on 38” Nitto ridge grapplers and the same yeti drag link, I hit the pothole the same and didnt get even a tiny amount of shimmy, perfectly solid.
I’ve checked ball joints and they’re solid, zero play with a pry bar, the tire also doesn’t rock when off the ground, its solid, I’ve checked torque on all bolts, I’m curious if there could be an issue with the way the Ride Right + Clayton kit achieves caster angle using only the upper control arms? Technically the front wheel is pulled back as it’s a 2.5” lift and the lower control arms are now angled, and then the 6.5 degrees of caster was achieved by shortening the upper control arms, could this be my problem? I’ve got a set of lower control arms I havent put on yet but I’m just looking for ideas, I’ll have the alignment redone by centering the axle with the lower control arms and then adjusting caster with the uppers.
In the garage I still have the Yeti tie rod to put on and a sector shaft brace as well as the Clayton adjustable lower control arms. Or do BFG KO2 tires suck? Would be odd that I had the same issue with 35s and 37s, different wheels as well. And I don’t want to discount the fact that this all seemed to start after the lift kit was installed though it could be a coincidence.
I got an interesting issue I’ve been tracking for awhile. I have a 2022 Jeep Wrangler High Tide that I had a shop put a 2.5” Clayton Ride Right+ kit on with Fox 2.0 shocks. Caster was set to 6.5 degrees
The kit includes 4 springs, sway bar endlinks, both track bars and front upper control arms to fix caster angle (upper not lower like most kits)
I ran it like this for a bit with the stock BFG KO2 35” tires and the first time it was cold out I got DW coming across an expansion joint on a highway, about 40 degrees out, this happened 2-3 more times within about 10 minutes and I pulled over at a Lowe’s grabbed a torque wrench and socket and tightened the track bar to 130ft lbs, it seemed to be just shy of this as it moved some but not much.
I took it back to the shop and they messed with it for a bit swapping out random parts with ones they had and determined it was the steering stabilizer (….BS), the factory one had a dead spot in it and they said the air in there might have been freezing. I replaced it with a Fox 2.0 through shaft stabilizer as I was looking for a stiffer wheel feeling anyway but spring came and we never had another issue.
Since then I’ve replaced the wheels and tires with Method 703’s and BFG KO2 37” load Cs, we had death wobble again about a month ago when it was around 30 degrees outside, I noticed a bit of play in the drag link at the pitman arm where it was clicking so I swapped that out for a Steer Smarts drag link (tie rod still in a box in the garage, will get to that later). The steering felt much stiffer after that but today I took it out at around 11 degrees outside and got DW again when hitting a gravel filled pot hole with only the driver side.
After this I immediately went back out with my 2022 Jeep Gladiator that has the full Clayton 2.5” Overland Plus kit on 38” Nitto ridge grapplers and the same yeti drag link, I hit the pothole the same and didnt get even a tiny amount of shimmy, perfectly solid.
I’ve checked ball joints and they’re solid, zero play with a pry bar, the tire also doesn’t rock when off the ground, its solid, I’ve checked torque on all bolts, I’m curious if there could be an issue with the way the Ride Right + Clayton kit achieves caster angle using only the upper control arms? Technically the front wheel is pulled back as it’s a 2.5” lift and the lower control arms are now angled, and then the 6.5 degrees of caster was achieved by shortening the upper control arms, could this be my problem? I’ve got a set of lower control arms I havent put on yet but I’m just looking for ideas, I’ll have the alignment redone by centering the axle with the lower control arms and then adjusting caster with the uppers.
In the garage I still have the Yeti tie rod to put on and a sector shaft brace as well as the Clayton adjustable lower control arms. Or do BFG KO2 tires suck? Would be odd that I had the same issue with 35s and 37s, different wheels as well. And I don’t want to discount the fact that this all seemed to start after the lift kit was installed though it could be a coincidence.
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