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Steering wheel wobble?

RubiRob

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But there are JLs with less than 10 miles on them that have the excessive steering wheel play. And many are reporting excessive steering play when they take it from the dealer's lot before they get home, so very little miles on them. What would cause so many OEM steering stabilizers to fail at 10 or even 100 miles? It would be interesting to take 2 brand new JLs, one with excessive steering play and one with normal steering play, remove the steering stabilizers and compare them like Command Line RC did. Yes, the track bar could be flawed causing the steering stabilizer to eventually go bad, but not immediately. Right?
I'm only speaking from experience. I installed a mopar lift and 37s. Had the wobble consistently on bumpy roads at 53-60mph. Didn't get better or worse just continued until I got out of that speed range. Was NOT death wobble.

- Installed Fox SS: did nothing
- Installed track bars: did nothing
- Got alignment done: did nothing
- Rotated tires 4 times with balancing: did nothing
- Adjusted Toe In myself at 1/16" in: did nothing
- Installed MC Adjustable control arms with 6.5 is of caster: Fixed, full stop

At this point i have a very very very tiny bit of this going on with those same potholes and bumps that goes away regardless. Some call this bump steer but ill just call it bump wobble since multiple places on the internet seem to have different explanations for bump steer. I can only attribute to whats left is a minor difference in drag link and track bar parallel. While this is certainly a different case between stock jeeps and mine, I can honestly say that even with replacing my factory SS I still had this issue. Also, I remember seeing someone on youtube hacking up his control arm brackets and using caster bolts (please don't do that) and he fixed steering issues with the added caster.
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jeremyjeep

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I'm only speaking from experience. I installed a mopar lift and 37s. Had the wobble consistently on bumpy roads at 53-60mph. Didn't get better or worse just continued until I got out of that speed range. Was NOT death wobble.

- Installed Fox SS: did nothing
- Got alignment done: did nothing
- Rotated tires 4 times with balancing: did nothing
- Adjusted Toe In myself at 1/16" in: did nothing
- Installed MC Adjustable control arms with 6.5 is of caster: Fixed, full stop

At this point i have a very very very tiny bit of this going on with those same potholes and bumps that goes away regardless. Some call this bump steer but ill just call it bump wobble since multiple places on the internet seem to have different explanations for bump steer. I can only attribute to whats left is a minor difference in drag link and track bar parallel. While this is certainly a different case between stock jeeps and mine, I can honestly say that even with replacing my factory SS I still had this issue. Also, I remember seeing someone on youtube hacking up his control arm brackets and using caster bolts (please don't do that) and he fixed steering issues with the added caster.
But did you have excessive steering play - where you turn the steering wheel 2 to 4 inches before the tires turn? I'm being specific to that particular issue (one of the symptoms that CommandLineRC fixed with the Fox stabilizer).
 

jeremyjeep

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I'll have to check the date when I get home...I'll let you all know.
To Command Line RC: The video that RubiRob posted was very interesting. In summary, the guy in the video (Ryan) said it won’t fix steering issues and is only a "luxury item". True, but if the OEM steering stabilizer is bad, then it would fix steering issues related to the steering stabilizer. Then again something else in the system could be causing the OEM stabilizer to go bad. But because people are reporting steering slop in the wheel day 1 with no miles on it, and same thing for JLs in dealer inventory, seems like a bad OEM stabilizer (design or otherwise) right off the bat. It will be interesting to see if the Fox steering stabilizer goes bad too because something else in the steering system (track bar problem mentioned before perhaps)? Thoughts?
 

Command Line RC

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I mean we are the first gen for the JL's. Many folks have great insight and input as towards what could be the issue and we have to take all of that into consideration. I definitely had steering slop on day one and thought to myself that this cannot be normal. I find it funny that stock and lifted Jeeps are having this "Death Wobble" experience, it's not just lifted Jeeps. Hell the cruise control recall for instance....cruise control has been out for how long and some how their managed to be a recall on that. Only time will tell for sure and I hope all of our issues get resolved sooner than later.
 

Nicholas6

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Will all dealers now know to look for that date on the stabilizers now, or does that usually get rolled out slowly? My Jeep was just at the dealer last week for this issue and they couldn’t replicate, so they didn’t do anything. If I get it back to them this week am I wasting my time?
 

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Command Line RC

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Will all dealers now know to look for that date on the stabilizers now, or does that usually get rolled out slowly? My Jeep was just at the dealer last week for this issue and they couldn’t replicate, so they didn’t do anything. If I get it back to them this week am I wasting my time?
I'm really not sure as of yet. I heard from a few different folks that this "fix" will be rolled out in a TSB later this week.
 

jeremyjeep

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I mean we are the first gen for the JL's. Many folks have great insight and input as towards what could be the issue and we have to take all of that into consideration. I definitely had steering slop on day one and thought to myself that this cannot be normal. I find it funny that stock and lifted Jeeps are having this "Death Wobble" experience, it's not just lifted Jeeps. Hell the cruise control recall for instance....cruise control has been out for how long and some how their managed to be a recall on that. Only time will tell for sure and I hope all of our issues get resolved sooner than later.
True. With the steering slop on day 1 (steering stabilizer can’t be worn out yet or damaged by other steering components with almost no miles on it) and now this date code on the OEM steering stabilizer, seems like a logical conclusion that there are some bad OEM stabilizers out there.
 

Command Line RC

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True. With the steering slop on day 1 (steering stabilizer can’t be worn out yet or damaged by other steering components with almost no miles on it) and now this date code on the OEM steering stabilizer, seems like a logical conclusion that there are some bad OEM stabilizers out there.
Could have been bad since day one...I mean some Jeeps weren't welded correctly either....who knows. I mean Chrysler rolled those Jeeps out without even looking to see if they were welded properly, I can only imagine that the "bad" steering stabilizer went under the radar as well.
 

RubiRob

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I can slightly wiggle my steering wheel and it will still go straight. I just attributed it to being the nature of the beast. I know it's not going to steer like my wife's IFS trailhawk. Not sure about nearly half a foot of wiggle though, I don't think it's that bad.
 

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Chewbacca2264

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With a number of these threads going right now it appears as though we are closer to narrowing this down. Seems to me that with the research coming out of Joe's Jeep Jungle that:
1. The stock front track bar has a full inch of deflection that tells us that the track bar is barely adequate or possibly inadequate for stock form let alone for a lifted Jeep with larger tires.
2. In another thread Redrockjk has noted finding bad steering stabilizers on three JL's that he has been working on, caveat is that they are all lifted using the Mopar lift. Sounds like these could be attributed to the deflection in the track bar, if it does not work to keep the Jeep centered over the axel then the stabilizer is bound to suffer from failure.
3. Now it appears while reading this thread that some of us have purchased Jeeps that right of the lot had bad steering dampers. Imagine adding a lift and bigger tires with an inadequate track bar and a non functioning damper...…….ummm can u say death wobble?
4. Many including Rob have had good luck adding caster and increasing it to as high as 7 for lifted vehicles. Sounds reasonable if you are adding a large lift to use adjustable control arms and add caster, problem is when someone is adding a mere 2 inches or in my case slightly less of lift should we really have to add caster to make it work? I ask that question not in a sarcastic manner but in a straight forward one, on the JK 2 inches of lift was nothing. Do we have an issue with poor design ( caster), bad run of parts (steering damper), or inadequate design (track bar)?

Just some thoughts as I continue to research and work toward a conclusion on my own rig.

Chewi
 

jeremyjeep

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With a number of these threads going right now it appears as though we are closer to narrowing this down. Seems to me that with the research coming out of Joe's Jeep Jungle that:
1. The stock front track bar has a full inch of deflection that tells us that the track bar is barely adequate or possibly inadequate for stock form let alone for a lifted Jeep with larger tires.
2. In another thread Redrockjk has noted finding bad steering stabilizers on three JL's that he has been working on, caveat is that they are all lifted using the Mopar lift. Sounds like these could be attributed to the deflection in the track bar, if it does not work to keep the Jeep centered over the axel then the stabilizer is bound to suffer from failure.
3. Now it appears while reading this thread that some of us have purchased Jeeps that right of the lot had bad steering dampers. Imagine adding a lift and bigger tires with an inadequate track bar and a non functioning damper...…….ummm can u say death wobble?
4. Many including Rob have had good luck adding caster and increasing it to as high as 7 for lifted vehicles. Sounds reasonable if you are adding a large lift to use adjustable control arms and add caster, problem is when someone is adding a mere 2 inches or in my case slightly less of lift should we really have to add caster to make it work? I ask that question not in a sarcastic manner but in a straight forward one, on the JK 2 inches of lift was nothing. Do we have an issue with poor design ( caster), bad run of parts (steering damper), or inadequate design (track bar)?

Just some thoughts as I continue to research and work toward a conclusion on my own rig.

Chewi
Good summary. Some people are saying that other components are causing the steering stabilizer to go bad. Well, that might be true some of the time, but some people have bad steering stabilizer symptoms right after they took ownership of it with less than 10 miles on it. According to articles (not forums) that I've read, a bad steering stabilizer can cause steering wobble, loose steering, vibrating steering wheel and more.
 

TheJoyceIsYours

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Do you have any info on this stabilizer TSB? Like a TSB number? Or anything? I don't see it on the Recall / TSB list here yet - https://www.jlwranglerforums.com/forum/threads/steering-wheel-wobble.16577/page-7#post-433876
So I called the service department today and I asked for the TSB, and I guess it wasn't a TSB- sorry I'm fairly unfamiliar with the tiers of severity in recalls etc. He said they put out a publication on 10/31. And the case number he gave me was S1819000004. Wasn't sure where to look for it but wanted to pass the number along at least.
 

jeremyjeep

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So I called the service department today and I asked for the TSB, and I guess it wasn't a TSB- sorry I'm fairly unfamiliar with the tiers of severity in recalls etc. He said they put out a publication on 10/31. And the case number he gave me was S1819000004. Wasn't sure where to look for it but wanted to pass the number along at least.
Great find. That's a Star case # by the way. :) Did you check your date code on the steering stabilizer vs the info in that case? You can see the date code and other info here: https://www.jlwranglerforums.com/forum/threads/steering-wheel-wobble.16577/page-8#post-436030
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