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Reno Wrangler

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Went driving on a washboard road yesterday. The JLUR was out of control. Worse than driving on ice. Had to go into 4WD to get control back. Have driven lots of washboard roads in 2WD with other vehicles and not had the controllability problems like the Wrangler. Is this common?
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Ma$$iveDebtAche

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What are your tires PSI? I live on a dirt road and set my tires to 30 PSI. The door's recommended 37 (& delivered 41), was way too harsh.
 

Brian0128

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Did you try to adjust your tire pressure? If so, what tire pressures did you try riding the road at?
 

limeade

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Are you still on stock suspension and steering? Do you have any handling/steering issues on paved roads (wandering, shimmy, etc)?
 

N5lp

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I have a stock 2 door Rubicon and I run the recommended tire pressure. On washboard roads the vehicle wants to swap ends. My solution is to drive very slow.
 

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sourdough

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My JLR was terrible stock. Mopar lift, 37" tires with 18 psi made it livable.
 

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My JLR was terrible stock. Mopar lift, 37" tires with 18 psi made it livable.
I see a lot of people are scared to go under 30 psi. On my last JK I needed a similar psi to get my Duratracs to wear evenly using the chalk test. I'm running about 24 psi on my 295/70/r17 Patagonia M/Ts.
 
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Reno Wrangler

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Are you still on stock suspension and steering? Do you have any handling/steering issues on paved roads (wandering, shimmy, etc)?
Sorry, should have included in the initial post that it is all stock. Tire pressures are in the mid 30's. I will have to double check that. We did not try to adjust the tire pressure while on the washboard road.
 

Arterius2

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I see a lot of people are scared to go under 30 psi. On my last JK I needed a similar psi to get my Duratracs to wear evenly using the chalk test. I'm running about 24 psi on my 295/70/r17 Patagonia M/Ts.
That’s because chalk tests are not relevant on modern tires. Especially modern MTs where outter shoulder blocks are not design to make full contact on flat pavement for noise and efficiency purposes. I wrote a long article on this a while back explaining the science behind modern tires. So if you go by the ancient chalk test now, you will always underinflate your tires and introduce them to unnecessary wear and also kill your mileage.

For optimal pressure for on-road use, I’d just refer to the number on your door jam.
 
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Arterius2

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Went driving on a washboard road yesterday. The JLUR was out of control. Worse than driving on ice. Had to go into 4WD to get control back. Have driven lots of washboard roads in 2WD with other vehicles and not had the controllability problems like the Wrangler. Is this common?
Sounds like you had just a bad case of “driving while stock”. To be fair, the other vehicles you see on the trail probably are driving under 4wd or more commonly in AWD.

There are definitely things you can do to improve washboard performance though, like airing down and getting better traction tires, and faster rebound shocks. Since you are only driving in 2WD, it’s essential to make sure you rear tires make contact with the washboards as often as possible. If they are bouncing up and down in the air, that is no good because you are losing traction. Your front wheels are providing 0 traction as well.

I overcome some of that by putting it into 4a selec-trac but since you are driving a Rubicon you don’t have that luxury.

I would also add that stiffer shocks and low rate springs would really improve washboard performance. If your suspension don’t “fall” into the potholes quick enough, they are essentially in mid-air and provide NO traction, keep that in mind when figuring out your build.
 

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Dkretden

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Went driving on a washboard road yesterday. The JLUR was out of control. Worse than driving on ice. Had to go into 4WD to get control back. Have driven lots of washboard roads in 2WD with other vehicles and not had the controllability problems like the Wrangler. Is this common?
You are asking if your experience was common?

in my limited experience, no, it isn’t.
 

Jabarsetti

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It is definitely frustrating to purchase such a capable vehicle to find out that its Achilles heel is washboard roads. My experience in my JLUR is no different then it was in my Silverado 1500, the back end will try to hop around a bit. Being in CO we take a lot of the Forest Service roads that have some pretty gnarly washboards and when I was stock I would air down, use 4H, and try to find and maintain the speed that would allow the suspension to rebound. I have since upgraded to 315/70r/17 (35's) Patagonia M/T's to me that has seem to help a lot. We went camping this weekend and and I ran at full psi (37ish) at 25-35mph in 2wd. The vehicle handled the washboards a lot better than before. I do have a lift in the garage waiting for free time and I am sure that will help a bit more but time will tell. My suggestion is if you plan on spending a lot of time on washboards either look at upgrading tires/suspension, if not then look into a decent tool to air down/air up when traveling those types of roads.
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