eot

Jey guys I have been reading off and on about the death wobble... Well it happened! between 45 & 50 in a curve with traffic. It took all my strength to hold the wheel and heading for the ditch. Ok what do i need to look at. I came home tonight jacked her up j=checked ball joints no play. Linkage seemeed tight. it scared the hell out of me. I will look at everything you guys suggest. Its stock with stock size tires. Pirrelli tires with only 5,000 miles on them wearing evenly. Help please dont want to have another truck wrecked of let my son go after materials and this happen... Thanks

boostjunkie1

Check your air pressure! You may have to much in them????

Lost Lake

First of all welcome to the DW club. Scary ain't it? Sure won't let anyone else drive it will you?

You'll get a lot of advice, some of it bad, and I hope you don't consider mine bad. This is what I would do.

1. Replace the steering damper. These trucks ride on the edge of stability, and the damper keeps you on the good side. New dampers are between $50 - $100. Even the Dodge ones are okay, I put a Rancho on mine and my DW went away instantly.

2. Check the caster. This is what makes your tire trail behind your axle's vertical centerline. Dodge has issued a TSB for DW and they recommend increasing caster and filling the front tires to maximum pressure. Many guys have gone as high as 6 degrees caster, Dodge specs are around 1.5 to 3.5 I think.... I have 3.4 and 3.5 on mine. The right should be a little more to compensate for road crown. I would not be afraid to take it to 5. Excess caster can cause tire wear, but which is worse... wear or death wobble?

3. Replace the track bar bushings. Geno's has urethane bushings for about $30. The rubber ones are more squishy and allow some flex.

4. Rotate the tires.

After you do these simple repairs you may be good. If you're not you can check back in. DW is a rolling of the tires sideways, and the truck overcomes this force and the axle hops up over the rolled tire and bounces. This shifts the track bar and as the axle comes up on one side it forces the other tire down and at an angle where that tire rolls under the rim and then it pops up and this cycle gets worse and worse. You had a bouncing front end, not like the old Jeeps that had a violent shimmy side to side.

I had a video showing the DW while it happens and once you see it you will instantly understand what is going on.

Implement these four fixes immediately and let us know how it is. I could control my DW by rotating tires and keeping air pressure up, but there was always one corner that would set it off no matter what. I drove with it for a year before I finally had enough and fixed it. Now I can't get mine to DW at all....

DBLR

Are your Pirrelli tires E rated?

eot

Thanks Lost Lake! I will do this wekend on the damper. Can those be bought locally the Ranchero I use to use that brand along time ago on shocks. I will do that first and get those bushings. And check tire pressure too. You say run the maximimum on the tires right? Alignbment to follow. not too many places around here can allign my truck theu say its too big.

bansh-eman

I just got my self a new Bilstein Damper from Geno's They are like 75 bucks.

coiler33

Just out of curiosity why is Dodge not feeling the heat like Toyota? This DW is a serious problem affecting alot of trucks but nothing.

Shorts

That's a real good question. I've been asking the same thing. They should be hearing it. Not sure how to get our voices to someone that will actually care.

Maybe we all need to start contacting our congressmen/women, especially while the Toyota case is hot?? If people in Washington receive a flood of mail on the same topic, they may start digging.

cincydiesel

Because General Motor's biggest competition is Toyota. Who owns GM? Oh yeah, its the Government..


Back on topic.. I had DW happen to me while pulling our 30ft GN. Pretty dang scary for those couple of seconds.. Glad I knew what it was as soon as it happened. Another big thank you to DTR for great information

WhiteMule

Try this for your complaint.

http://www-odi.nhtsa.dot.gov/ivoq/

Lost Lake

Thanks Whitemule, I'll fill that out!

I think Dodge has an easy way out. They can almost always tell you something you did is wrong.

If you change tires you are wrong. If something is worn you are wrong. Like I said, these things are balancing on a tight rope to stay stable. If anything wiggles that tight rope you fall. So Dodge just points to something that upsets the balance.

They have gone on and admitted there is a problem, and issued the TSB calling for caster changes and inflating tires. The caster will fight the wheel turning, and the air pressure increase will fight the rolling flex of the sidewalls.

And yeah, eot you can buy those dampers anywhere. Some like different brands, but I'll bet you anything that if you rotate your tires, inflate to maximum pressure and replace that damper your troubles will be gone.

Now to stabilize that tight rope a bit, adjust your caster more and then you can play with tire pressures that give you a better ride than 80 psi.

Remember when you load the rear end you are decreasing your front caster. So don't be afraid to increase it for stability.

Fisherguy

Changing the damper is not a cure, it only masks the problem.
Take it in and get the front end checked, check the track bar bushings closely, try someone else's tires and wheels.

mitternocht

You might want to consider the updated steering components….If you have to replace any of the rod joints, this is what you will get......I'd also look at one of the aftermarket steering sector shaft stabilizers.


https://www.dieseltruckresource.com/...=220996&page=4

eot

Well I changed that junk damper! it was bad. I would not think on an 06 it would be but it was and it made a difference! the tires only have less than 5000 on them i will wait to rotate them. Pressure is max. it sure seems alot better. i did install a Ranch stabilizer. More money but i hoped it was better. Hey have any of you changed axle joints. I need to but have not done that. How much of a pain can it be. i looked on here but did not find any info on how to. Thanks

thenrie

Not to hijack this thread, but I'm trying to learn here (and stay alive and not bend my truck). A couple questions about DW:

- Does this happen to any particular configuration (QCSB, SCLB, 4wd, vs 2wd, dually or SRW)?
- Does having a "leveler" lift kit affect propensity to DW?

- Lost Lake said a load in the bed "decreases caster". Question on that.

I believe positive caster is forward of the axle vertical centerline and negative caster is aft of the vertical centerline. Since negative caster is what we want (makes the wheels follow better, more stable), doesn't a load in the bed, which lowers the rear of the truck, effectively increase the desirable negative caster (eg increase from -1.5 to -2.5 degrees)? Or do I have it backwards?

I used to have a 52 Studebaker Champion Starlight Coupe that had positive caster by design, to make steering easier before the days of power steering. Steering was fine, but you couldn't tow the car worth a darn with a towbar. Front wheels wouldn't follow well when towed. They would turn all the way to lock as soon as you tried to tow it around a sharp turn. Towed it from AZ to TX and had to get out and straighten the front wheels every time I got off the freeway to stop for gas.