Death Wobble Help

[IrishKreme]

I purchased a 2018 Jeep Wrangler Sport JL at the end of last year and it had been running perfectly for about 18k miles. Recently I went into my local dealership for a routine oil change / tire rotation and they notified me that there was a recall out on the steering damper so they also replaced that.


After I took my vehicle out I began to notice a shake while driving around 60 or above, especially after hitting small bumps. Sometimes it’s minor, sometimes I need to pull into the break-down lane and slow down a lot for the shake to stop. Again, this did not happen until they replaced my original damper.


Since then I’ve returned to the dealership a total of 6 times within the last 30 days asking them to address the issue. The first 4 times all they did was replace the damper with another new damper and the same issue occurred. Before the 5th time I called Jeep support and they set me up with a case manager who scheduled another appointment via a 3way call with the dealership. The 5th time i went back, they replaced the damper again, and the same problem happened again. After contacting my case manager from Jeep they set up another appointment and this time replaced the damper and re torqued some ball joints. The issue is still happening


Upon experiencing this I did my own research online and came across your forum where I see many people are reporting similar issues. I am not super car savvy so making adjustments myself isn’t really an option.


My jeep is completely stock and I am really not sure how to proceed with this. It’s especially frustrating because I wasn’t experiencing any issue until they did this maintenance. Does anyone have any advice on how to proceed?


Thanks!!

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[Roky]

I purchased a 2018 Jeep Wrangler Sport JL at the end of last year and it had been running perfectly for about 18k miles. Recently I went into my local dealership for a routine oil change / tire rotation and they notified me that there was a recall out on the steering damper so they also replaced that.


After I took my vehicle out I began to notice a shake while driving around 60 or above, especially after hitting small bumps. Sometimes it’s minor, sometimes I need to pull into the break-down lane and slow down a lot for the shake to stop. Again, this did not happen until they replaced my original damper.


Since then I’ve returned to the dealership a total of 6 times within the last 30 days asking them to address the issue. The first 4 times all they did was replace the damper with another new damper and the same issue occurred. Before the 5th time I called Jeep support and they set me up with a case manager who scheduled another appointment via a 3way call with the dealership. The 5th time i went back, they replaced the damper again, and the same problem happened again. After contacting my case manager from Jeep they set up another appointment and this time replaced the damper and re torqued some ball joints. The issue is still happening


Upon experiencing this I did my own research online and came across your forum where I see many people are reporting similar issues. I am not super car savvy so making adjustments myself isn’t really an option.


My jeep is completely stock and I am really not sure how to proceed with this. It’s especially frustrating because I wasn’t experiencing any issue until they did this maintenance. Does anyone have any advice on how to proceed?


Thanks!!

When they rotated your tires did they balance them? It’s possible that you threw a weight and didn’t notice it until that tire got put on the front. Also they may have over inflated them as well. Just a couple small things to check. Some people are having problems with getting their dampener put on backwards, there’s a sticker on them with arrows on it but doesn’t seem matter. Although, if you had six of them put on , they’re bound to have put one in the right way, lol.

 

[IrishKreme]

When they rotated your tires did they balance them? It’s possible that you threw a weight and didn’t notice it until that tire got put on the front. Also they may have over inflated them as well. Just a couple small things to check. Some people are having problems with getting their dampener put on backwards, there’s a sticker on them with arrows on it but doesn’t seem matter. Although, if you had six of them put on , they’re bound to have put one in the right way, lol.

Yeah I verified with them that they did both a rotation and a balance, because my first thought was something went wrong with that as well.

 

[Chipe]

When they rotated your tires did they balance them? It’s possible that you threw a weight and didn’t notice it until that tire got put on the front. Also they may have over inflated them as well. Just a couple small things to check. Some people are having problems with getting their dampener put on backwards, there’s a sticker on them with arrows on it but doesn’t seem matter. Although, if you had six of them put on , they’re bound to have put one in the right way, lol.

What Roky said, easy checks. If that's not the issue, wobble is generally caused by something beiung loose in the suspension: tie rod ends, ball joints, drag link, etc.

I'm also hoping they did an alignment after they were messing around under there? Also, why didn't they just put on the old, original steering stabilizer to see if that cured the problem? Do they still have it?

Keep us posted.

And also, check out your lemon laws in your state. It seems to me you are getting close to the requirements for meeting it.

 

[IrishKreme]

What Roky said, easy checks. If that's not the issue, wobble is generally caused by something beiung loose in the suspension: tie rod ends, ball joints, drag link, etc.

I'm also hoping they did an alignment after they were messing around under there? Also, why didn't they just put on the old, original steering stabilizer to see if that cured the problem? Do they still have it?

Keep us posted.

And also, check out your lemon laws in your state. It seems to me you are getting close to the requirements for meeting it.

I don't believe they have the original damper anymore. I think they've just been tossing out the ones that get replaced. It was a little under a week between the first 2 appointments so it was long gone by then. I have also been investigating the lemon laws and I certainly hope it doesn't come to that, but replacing the same part over and over definitely isn't doing the trick.

 

[Chipe]

I don't believe they have the original damper anymore. I think they've just been tossing out the ones that get replaced. It was a little under a week between the first 2 appointments so it was long gone by then. I have also been investigating the lemon laws and I certainly hope it doesn't come to that, but replacing the same part over and over definitely isn't doing the trick.

Just keep track of all the time, the amount of downtime, the appointments, what was said. Write it down. You may need it.

 

[Roky]

I don't believe they have the original damper anymore. I think they've just been tossing out the ones that get replaced. It was a little under a week between the first 2 appointments so it was long gone by then. I have also been investigating the lemon laws and I certainly hope it doesn't come to that, but replacing the same part over and over definitely isn't doing the trick.

The next thing I would check is the track bar. There was an update for them as well. The factory track bars are extremely lightweight basically junk, imho. The first thing I did to my rig even before I took out the window sticker was replace my track bar and steering stabilizer with aftermarket ones.

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