Toe in gave me Death Wobble

[srt20]

I’ve had steering wheel shimmy over certain bumps lately. It was annoying me so I checked all the steering joints and trackbar joints. Nothing was loose. Decided to check toe, and it was 3/16” toe OUT. So I changed it to toe’d in. I was trying for 1/8” toe’d in but it ended up being 1/4” in. Took it for a drive on a road that has a certain bump to causes shimmy. It gave me full on death wobble. Had to slow to 20 mph from 50 to get it to stop.

Went back home figuring I didnt know how to read a tape measure. But it was 1/4” in. Reset it to 1/8” in and went back out. Same thing. Full death wobble.

Not sure why it was only shimmy toe’d out and DW when I toe’d in.

It’s a 2018 JLUR with 35/12.5/17 KO2 at 27psi. All suspension and steering has been replaced within the last 13k miles.
MC Gamechanger 2.5 with rocksports.
RockJock drag link and Tie rod.
Synergy (I think) ball joints. If they aren’t Synergy, they are some other well known brand.
I didnt check castor today, but last time I did I had it around 8*.
OEM steering stabilizer and Aluminum steering box are on the Jeep. I haven’t replaced them because I feel they are working fine.
43,800 total miles on it. Only ever got shimmy after the lift. Tires were installed well before the lift.

Another interesting piece of info, the shimmy seemed to only start when the driver front wheel hit a bump. The passenger front never seemed to start the shimmy. Im unsure if its the same for the DW, I didnt have enough time to try it out.

Anyone got any ideas?

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[Jtphoto]

Do you have the MCfront trackbar?

 

[srt20]

Do you have the MCfront trackbar?

Yeah. GameChanger comes with both track bars.

 

[AcesandEights]

It's your caster.

 

[srt20]

It's your caster.

Too much?

When I did the lift, if I went lower it would shimmy worse. That’s why so high. But I did replace the BJ since then.

 

[Zandcwhite]

Something is worn, likely the mc track bar bushings. Wheeling clapped out old Jeeps for the last 20 years, toe out will often mask death wobble caused by worn parts in my experience. Proper toe in doesn't cause the wobble but it won't hide it like toe out.

 

[srt20]

Ive thought about it more. I am going to square the axle in the chassis again. My toe wasn’t where I thought it was, so maybe axle isn’t either.
So I’ll do that hopefully this weekend or early next week and I’ll let you know if anything is off. I will likely take every joint apart also and really check the bushings. Though I will say, I will be quite disappointed if any bushings are worn. We live in WI and tbh 98% of the miles are on road. Not many places to off road around here and I usually only get one or 2 trips west a summer. We park the Jeep in the shop over winter because of salt.

 

[Jtphoto]

Metal Cloak track bar bushings are easy to change so if that is the issue, it’s easily corrected.

 

[Old Dogger]

Did you check the torque on your ball joints. Some were never torqued from the factory. Did you have the upgraded cast iron steering box installed? Also you may need to add adjustable lower control arms, because the JL’s with the electronic assist steering, like 6 degrees caster.

 

[CNJLUR4xe]

I had the same experience when I installed my lift, accidentally landed on 1/4" toe in (no steering stabilizer) and had full on death wobble. Took it to my buddy's shop and did another alignment on his machine and set it to 1/16" toe in (also drilled the stock stabilizer out and put it on) and it never wobbled again.

22 JLUR 4Xe
3.75" Rusty's lift
Rusty's HD AL drag link and tie rod
Fox 2.5s from Accutune
37 Maxxis Razr AT ~25 psi

Installed after DW was resolved:
Teraflex ball joints
Fox ATS
1.25" wheel spacers
RK rear track bar bracket (highly recommend if over 2" lift, made a huge difference in head tossing)

 

[Friday2322]

The well known shop I used for my MC install said that the suspension should be slightly toe-out for the MC lifts. I don't know if this is correct but seems okay on mine. I would think your castor is too high and should be in the 6-6.5 range.

 

[Stormin’ Moorman]

Just a note, it's so hard to tell if anything on your suspension is causing DW because it takes so little movement to get it going. My 2019 had DW because the bushings on the Rock Krawler track bar were garbage and allowing a tiny bit of movement. Good luck sorting it out.

 

[Jtphoto]

The well known shop I used for my MC install said that the suspension should be slightly toe-out for the MC lifts. I don't know if this is correct but seems okay on mine. I would think your castor is too high and should be in the 6-6.5 range.

Interestingly ATV/UTV are set up with a bit of toe-out to make them more stable and prevent shakes. However, it is harder on tires. I like 1/16-1/8” max toe in. When pushing forward the toe of the tires tend to push out so if you have a bit of play in your tierods you would be effectively at 0 when driving.

 

[srt20]

Steering stabilizer is bad. Have a Teraflex 2.1 coming on Monday.

I dropped caster to 7.3*. Was at 8.5*. I may drop it more if it stays on my mind tonight. But right now I feel “ok” with it.

LCA are torqued to ~205lbs.

Trackbar both ends are ~210lbs.

I’m out of time for today, so I didnt check BJs. Though I doubt they are loose. Ive done all the work myself and never ever leave stuff loose. But I will check for sure.

Jeep is on stands under axles at ride height. The front axle was within 1/4” of square, though I have to remeasure since I lengthened the UCA.

I still may remove LCA and trackbar to inspect bushings and make sure they weren’t preloaded when I tightened them originally, but I am very OCD and feel confident I did it correctly originally.

I hope to finish it up tomorrow and drive it without the SS. I have a hard time believing a bad SS could cause all this, but hopefully….

 

[PatrickR]

Toe in will tend to make dw worse, so that completely makes sense. Ideal for jl is around 1/8" toe out.

However, if you're getting dw more from hits on one side instead of the other, I'd look at ball joints. I chased dw issues all over until I finally bit the bullet and replaced ball joints, which completely fixed the issue.

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