So I didn't end up doing the tie rod ends on saturday as I realized I was missing the long tie rod at the knuckle. Ordered it today though. In light of the freed up saturday I decided to go wheeling a bit and ended up hitting some pretty serious stuff. I completely caked the Jeep with mud and managed to scratch my relatively pretty paint all to hell. After all this I noticed a slight vibe on the highway on the way home that evening. On Sunday I went about the usual mud washing and chassis rinse that I always do after i wheel it and it was pretty thick under there. The real problem is that after the rinse I took it out for a drive and at about 55mph it started to shake like crazy. I didn't knock off any wheel weights, and the shake is a bit too severe for tire balance (especially with my dinky 235s). I'm down to three possible culprits here. It could be...

A: I've damaged some part of my steering and caused it to be further out of alignment.
B: I already needed to align it but planned on doing it after replacing the tie rod ends.
C: Maybe I've damaged my track bar and need to replace it as well.

Beyond those ideas I'm stumped. Have I diagnosed this properly or am I really missing something obvious here?

 

Sounds like your going down the right path. I don't know how serious it is but you could have broke a belt or two in a tire. I would check that. Also jack the front up and take the top and bottom of the tire with one hand and rock the tire to see how the wheel bearings are. Just some other ideas.

 

Sounds like the dreaded "death wobble" to me. However I didnt think it affected stock rigs. I had a similar issue and ended up replacing the tires which helped a lot (bias ply swampers to BFG muds)

 

i had the death wobble on my stocker when i rotated the tires it went away just crawl under and make shure everything is tight,ball joints,trackbar,wheel berings,etc

death wobble sucks espesialy when the wife and kid are in the car

 

Alignment
tire balance
ball joint
dented or out of balanced driveshafts
ujoints
unit bearings
bent tie rod get a zj v8 one
trac bar

 

Alignment
tire balance
ball joint
dented or out of balanced driveshafts
ujoints
unit bearings
bent tie rod get a zj v8 one
trac bar

 

Wicked hit pretty much everything it could be. I'd check for loose wheels and missing balancing weights first. Then I'd look for loose or worn tie rod ends and the dreaded track bar.
The track has got to be completely tight (torqued to OEM spec at the top (62 ft. lbs.) and the bottom (74 ft. lbs.) and nothing can be loose or worn. With the XJ sitting still and running rock your steering wheel side to side. If the front of the XJ moves the opposite way you are steering then you have worn or loose track bar issues.

 

Thanks for all the replies, it's not totally syock though, I do have a 3" RC lift if that matters. I didn't think to check the wheel bearings either. thanks for pointing that one out. I assume that unit bearing=wheel bearing? I guess since I'll be replacing most of the steering this weekend (as long as that tie rod makes it here by then) I'll have to check the wheel bearings and the condition of my trackbar today. Fortunately it drives smooth as silk below 55mph so I can still get around in the meantime. I'll give everything a good once over after therapy today and I'll let you guys know what I find, thanks again!

 

Don't think the "dinky" 235s can't be an issue... I couldn't quite get rid of my DW on my ZJ even after new tie rod ends everywhere. Tires wouldn't stay balanced. 235/75-15 BFG ATs. In the end, I don't know if they wouldn't stay balanced and caused that set of wheels to loosen, or the wheels loosened and caused the tires to go out of balance. I replaced the tires (with 30/9.5-15s and wheels completely and it mostly went away. I still had a little vibe at 50-55 though. Bugged me, but never developed back to Death Wobble. Recently, I swapped my stock front control arms for some fixed lowers and adjustable uppers, all with new bushings. Now I don't even have that vibe. And I've gone up another tire size (31/10.50-15s) and another set of wheels and 2" BB.

 

get sticky weights they don't fall off as easy

 

Well everything seems ok, all the wheel weights are there and nothings all that loose. I'm leaning towards calling it the alignment as that is the one thing that seems to be the most out of wack. I just wanted to cover all my bases. Thanks for all your help guys. I'll just have to deal with it till saturday, then I'll be replacing most of the steering and I''l do the alignment. I'll let you guys know how it goes!

 

same thing happened to me and the same speed when i first bought my jeep.
turned out the sob sold me a jeep with two tires that had broken belts and flat spots all in them.
you need to get your tires looked at those things could explode on your @$$!

 

Haha, I sure don't need any exploding tires. I guess I should probably see about having them inspected/balanced. I'll see how much a fresh alignment helps, and if there is still an issue I'll do that for sure.