Wheel wobble at 50-70 mph

[marcussly27]

I have new 17x8 wheelsmith steelies on balanced 265 BFG "trail" terrains (more road focused over all terrains) which I'm running at 28psi per JamesDuff recommendations. 2.5 SL 2 BL. 4 degrees of caster with stock radius arms and 7 degree C bushings. I forget what my toe and camber are but both are slightly positive since my last alignment just a couple months ago. I have the new JamesDuff dual sport heim steering system installed TRO with a track bar riser bracket welded onto the axle. My track bar and drag link are perfectly parallel. Around 50mph, a very annoying wobble in the steering wheel appears and it's driving me crazy! From 70-80 it disappears. Other then this VERY VERY annoying issue she drives fantastic, tracks straight, and is a joy to handle.

What am I missing? In talking with JD they suggested the 28psi and also locking my tie rod in place, one heim rolled up and one rolled down to prevent it from rolling. I need to get some red loctite to do that otherwise when I lock in the jam nuts and bring the wheel all the way left/right it loosens and the roll is back in the tie rod.

Any suggestions are appreciated. Thanks!

 

[gnpenning]

Who's balancing your tires have you had them rebalanced? Did you have them road forced balanced?

Have you double checked to make sure your hubs are unlocked and you are in 2wd?

When is the last time you checked and lubed your driveline?

 

[marcussly27]

I’ve had them balanced three times since getting new wheels recently. Can you explain road forced balanced please?

Hubs are unlocked in 2wd. Driveline is all new, how would that affect the steering wheel? I’ll check and lube to cross that off though.

 

[gnpenning]

Here is one link to explain road force balancing. It was the first to pop up. There are others.
https://www.discounttire.com/learn/road-force-balancing.

Rear driveline shouldn't give you major steering wheel vibration, sometimes people might miss other vibrations that are happening at the same time.

Have you played with air pressure at all?

 

[spap]

are you getting them balanced at the same place? I bought some tires for my expedition at costo , and couldn’t figure out why I still had vibration. After 3 x back still vibration. Went somewhere else and it was fine. 4wheel parts has great wheel balance machines. Took my bronco s 35s there and it really helped.
no saying is the balance , but it might be.
oh ad it’s freaking annoying when you have the one thing I assuming you have checked the bearings and all the suspension components
good luck.

 

[gnpenning]

I should have asked if you have tried rotating the tires and seeing if the vibration follows the tire ?

 

[DirtDonk]

I wouldn’t necessarily want to lock the rod ends in place in a jammed up condition. You don’t want the tire rod to roll much, so I understand what they’re trying to do. But they need to rotate at least somewhat during normal steering input.
Can you post pictures of your front steering linkage? Like to see how that’s all put together.
And all with just 2 1/2 inches of lift?
Those are great caster numbers with just 7° C bushings. Is this a 76, or a 77 model front end by any chance?

How can the hubs being locked or the transfer case being in four-wheel-drive effect the steering wheel? Easy.
If a steering u-joint is binding up you can get a pretty good shimmy.
Or if the front pinion angle is too steep, you’ll get a driveline vibration that can be transmitted up through the steering wheel.

But let’s get some more detail here. Just how severe is the wobble? How much does the steering wheel move?
If it’s more than a vibration, it’s probably still coming from a tire. Whether from being out of balance, or just being defective (which does happen), the tires are usually the only thing that can put a true wobble into the steering wheel.
If it’s just a slow oscillation of the wheel, it’s hard to say. But if it’s a real notable and hard to stop wobble in the steering wheel, it’s probably a tire.
So the recommendation to rotate at least one tire, if not two, is a real good first step.

 

[marcussly27]

I havent rotated the tires but that's also a good idea! I called Belle Tire and they'll "road force" balance them $15 each, not a bad way to get that crossed off I guess but i've had them balanced at two seperate auto shops (not tire shops) without any success in getting rid of the vibration. I'm not a tire expert by any means, does the road force balance really help that much? Worth a shot for 60 bucks for sure. Also all the steering compoenents are new so no issues with bearings or old parts that's for sure. Thanks guys.

 

[DirtDonk]

If you do get them balanced before rotating, you could just do the front two tires.
That saves you $30 and will confirm or disprove the theory.

Road force balance does make a difference, but only when nothing else works.
Usually if it takes a road force balance to make it even drivable, there’s some small defect in the tire carcass. Not necessarily a dangerous defect, but one that only shows up when the weight of the vehicle is on the tires.
That’s what road force, balance mimics. The weight of the vehicle pressing the tire onto the ground and creating basically a flat spot in the contact patch area.

 

[marcussly27]

It's a subtle wobble in the wheel only, truck itself isn't affected. Here's some pics for reference.

 

[DirtDonk]

You can’t post the pictures directly to the discussion unless you’re a “contributor” for 12 bucks a year.
Otherwise, you can use another image hosting site, or even put them up in your “garage“ and “gallery“ functions in your User CP.

 

[marcussly27]

Had to renew my membership. Here you go!

 

[DirtDonk]

Isn’t the tie rod “saddle“ supposed to be rotated up at approximately 60°? Like the factory setup, roughly pointed at the bottom of the radiator?

It looks from here like the tie rod was probably rotated to locate the draglink in a more parallel fashion.
If you rotate it up the way it supposed to be (at least in my way of thinking) that will put the drag link and track bar back out of parallel again.
But maybe you have some more leeway on the trackbar?

Either way, that upward angle of the saddle, where the draglink mounts to the tie rod, is there to reduce tie rod roll when you’re steering.
Having it aimed almost straight forward like you have literally guarantees that you are pulling and pushing on the tie rod.
You always get a little tie rod roll, especially with Heim style joints. But it can at least be minimized.
Right now you are maximizing it.

It’s not a guarantee that this is creating your problem. In fact, most likely not, but it’s definitely not helping.
And it’s creating other issues for the future.

 

[DirtDonk]

In the pictures angled more from the side, you can see that your drag link and track bar are definitely not parallel. At least not as they sat while that picture was taken.
Raising the lower end of the draglink will make them more parallel as it sits now.
However, due to tie rod role that relationship changes every time you transition from side to side.

Like so many things that we modify, getting it right is a balance. And not always based on “by the book“ design.
More often, it’s an “as built for this particular vehicle“ kind of a thing.

 

[DirtDonk]

And I presume that the locking/jam nuts were undone simply while you were working on things?
Reason I ask is that you don't want the trackbar nut unlocked. Since it looks like your trackbar has a spherical rod end upper joint ("Heim") you don't need the rod end to pivot on the threads. And you don't want that.
Did you apply anti-seize to the threads too by the way? Not always a requirement, but for steering components like these it's often a good idear.

I don't mind a trackbar that pivots, but in your case that's what the upper rod end is supposed to be fore. So you don't wear out or jam up your adjusting threads.
I think we've found a good percentage of adjustable trackbars seize/rust up over the years, so protecting the threads is a good practice.

Paul

 

[DirtDonk]

It's a subtle wobble in the wheel only, truck itself isn't affected.

Because it's only at such high speeds, it could still be any of the above. Or all of the above!
But if it acts the same after dialing in the steering/suspension linkage, my money is still on a tire.

And while I appreciate the higher tech aspect of a road-force balance, I'm still thinking rotating the tires is a first step.
If it works, it saves you even the first $60 bucks of the new re-balance.
Which sounds to me like it is a good price! So not a big loss if you do get it done.

Another reason for rotating first, is that some internal faults can't be corrected even with road-force balancing. And if you narrow down a bad tire, or tires, you still have some reasonable expectation that the tire company will replace. If they're as new as they sound, there should be no question as to a fault with the tire.
As long as you can repeat the issue with a witness that is.

Paul

 

[Yeller]

I’m with Paul on it being a tire or a wheel out of tolerance. Either will cause that issue.

Does it go away if driving longer distance, like 20+ miles? I believe that tire has a nylon belt. That can make the tire have a slight flat spot that goes away. My wife’s old suv did that for the first 15 miles or so. Was really bad when it was cold, one set of the tires were the same that you are running.

 

[spap]

I see the problem. It’s to nice and clean geez that looks good

 

[toddz69]

Yeah - fix the angle on the tie rod saddle first - then continue with troubleshooting.

Todd Z.

 

[73azbronco]

My 2 cents from other experts and my experience. Heim joints are great for upper and lower control arms, but when used on more precise steering components, the heim joint itself is not as good as a ball joint, ever. It has play a ball joint does not have.