Hey All, Trying to help a friend out with his 1994 Cherokee 4.0. He's experiencing a death wobble in his front end, at around 60 to 70 mph,...nearly shakes the steering wheel out of his hand. His shop says he needs both tracking bars replaced and shocks, total cost at around $700. Is there anything less expensive he can do to get him by to correct this in the short run? Is there a tutorial thread anyone can point us to, to try to solve this issue? Thanks
That sounds right to me. i spent around that amount on my 88 cherokee. good luck as that scared me as i was on a curve the first time I had that problem. Just bought a 98 6cyl 5 speed cherokee and so far so good except I need to put a roof rack on.
Death wobble is normally caused by play in bushings and rod ends of suspension and steering. Also a bad working steering stabilizer can add to it. Don't think that bad shocks will be a cause for death wobble, but it can increase the effect. If your friend is a little bit handy or you are, you could do the job yourself and save some bucks. Be very carefull with this and don't leave it unattended, because as the name already mentiones, this fenomena can be quite dangerous and cause an accident
Thanks Frank Are there any tutorials out there with this site or others where someone has gone in and replaced a few parts to address this issue? Any step by step with photos?
i appreciate your help and will pass everything on to my friend out in Arizona.
I have red about the death wobble on WJ´s. The whole front suspension should be checked for worn bushings of the control arms and especially for play on all the steering rod ends. All parts with play or which are worn, should be replaced. I´m not familiar with the Cherokee, but on the grand cherokee there is only one track bar, it keeps the whole front axle fixed axially. The control arms keep the axle fixed laterally. Also not well balanced wheels, uneven tire pressure, worn ball joints of the suspension or worn wheel bearings are also suspects of causing the death wobble.
Don't forget to check the steering gear itself. Mine developed some play in it on my XJ. It was a DIY job to change it out with a rebuilt unit, but pulling the Pitman arm off the old one was a major pia even with good pullers.
Running oversized tires can also cause this. Mine started doing it when I went up 2 tires sizes over stock. Now I'm looking into putting dual stabilizer shocks on the steering link to control the problem. I'm sure in my case the problem is the bigger / heavier tires.
Not really .... I've had three sizes over stock for 15 years. Drove perfect until the control arm bushings wore out. Adding another steering stablizer just masks the root cause.
Listening to everyone complain about a wobble or vibration in the steering wheel and front end, it appears that this is a common problem with the Jeeps. I have a 2 month old Jeep Grand Cherokee and it has a continuing wobble in the steering wheel since 60 miles. I know have 1400 miles. This might be a recall item.
Hey All, Trying to help a friend out with his 1994 Cherokee 4.0. He's experiencing a death wobble in his front end, at around 60 to 70 mph,...nearly shakes the steering wheel out of his hand. His shop says he needs both tracking bars replaced and shocks, total cost at around $700. Is there anything less expensive he can do to get him by to correct this in the short run? Is there a tutorial thread anyone can point us to, to try to solve this issue? Thanks
there are ways of checking Tie rods , ball joints ,Hub Bearings , Track bar ,etc. I am trying to find a good track bar vid. but what you want to look for is any movement on the solid mount end or Up and down movement on the other end