so i have the death wobbles but it varys, my car is a 55 pontiac cheiftan lowered 2 inches in the rear but i did have the front end alligned, i am running L78/15 bias plys, the wobbles started showing up at 60-65 mph, now they show up around 45-50 go away at 55-60 and show up around 70. i have checked my king pins and there is just a slight bit of movent. should i get the front end aligned again? or maybe my tires are out of round? help me please
How is the rest of the front end, tie rod ends, shock absorbers, a-arm bushings? An alignment is good to do, but the first thing is to have a sound front end to align.
I would check the tires first for balance and out of round, there is no sense paying for an alignment with loose parts, thats just throwing money away.
the front end does need a rebuild, the lower a arm on the driver side shifts sometimes if i crank the wheel to hard, i figured if it was king pins it would do it all the time, and every one in a while if i leave it in third and go about 45-50 it doesnt do it till i shift
I had a '60 Pontiac the tie rod ends wore out and the tires wore scalloped on the inside, it would wobble like that before I changed them.
the tires dont have any odd wear patterns on them, im am in the process of having all the money for the front end rebuild kit, but its my only car to drive so im trying to do somthing to to help it to keep her on the road for now, there is a shop in my town that has a alignment rack from the early 60's and the guy who runs it knows how to align king pin front ends.
Have the same type of problem with a lifted O/T Jeep Wrangler. Front end is in good condition and am using a heavy duty steering stabilizer and new poly track bar bushing. All of this helped but what stopped the problem was having the "Big Tars" rebalanced by a shop with a road force balancer. The guy knew his biz and said that he checked the alignment but that it was within spec and the main problem was poorly balanced tires. One thing that contributed was that the PO wanted the aluminum wheels to look good so he had the tires balanced with no weights on the outside of the rims. It's like making a guy fight with one arm tied behind him. Looking cool is tough when the front end is shaking like it was in detox. Find a quality shop that has been around awhile and have the balance and alignment checked by someone competent.
that does make sence 41, i just washed my white walls and noticed i have no weights on the out side, i dont care if there are weights on the out side but i wonder if the tire shop didnt put them on to make the rims cleaner? i never told them not to put them on so i wonder???? because if you think about it no rim is perfect to not have a weight on the out side. i think ill go in the next couple of days and get them rebalenced. its worth a try
Poncho, ask around some of the parts store for the best tire and front end shop and make an appointment. I was really pleased with the difference having the jeep tires properly balanced made. I run 33x12.50x15's on the jeep and a big heavy tire like these can really make a mess out things if they are out of balance. On my 41 I had the weights put where ever necessary for proper balance then painted the weights the same color as the steel wheels I run. The wheels are powder coated but I was able to mix one-shot into a matching shade and carefully camoflage the weights so they didn't distract as much as natural lead color would. If at all possible find a shop that has the equipment to road force balance your tires it's worth the small price difference.
This happened to my 55 Star Chief (had air bags) and I went thru everything I could think of with no luck. Finally installed sway bars and it went away. Good luck
Poncho, you could actualy have no wieghts on the outside and have it balanced. Inside stick-um weights is one way. Another is: a good tire store will be able to balance them without weights on the outside with a good balance machine. Balance problems occur generally at 35 and 65 -70 mph and feels like the front is jumping. They would have to be REALLY bad/cheap tires though. On the BIG truck tires it is very noticable, since it is a LOT more weight rotating and they tend to be more out of balance from the factory.
Did it have this problem before you installed those tires? Did it sit for a long time? Your tires could be slightly out of round and/or have some flat spots. Is the front end shaking and vibrating, or is the steering wheel actually wanting to move back and forth in your hands? (It's a big difference - one is vibration you can feel through the steering wheel and the other is the front of the car steering itself all over the road.)
After looking up the speed rating on "L" tires, It seems that you are pushing the envelope a little driving that fast (not to mention the weight of your car) on those tires as the rating on those tires is max'd @ 75mph. If you want to keep the Bias ply's and still want to drive the high speeds...Try finding Belted bias ply's, they are not full belted so they will still have that nice bias look but will handle better than a full bias.
If you have A arms there are no king pins. They are ball joint. Dose the car have a straight axle as in your avatar?
Incorrect ^^^ Check those tires and u-joints too. Lowering this car may be causing the driveshaft to rub on the rear most body support as well.
I guess the Chevy's where ahead of the pontiacs in that year. Found this article on converting to ball joints. http://www.pontiacsafari.com/L1Garage/BallJointConversion.pdf
Any car with a typical independent front suspension has A-arms, and MOST of them prior to 1955 have kingpins. This includes 1938-1954 Chevies and 193?-1957 Pontiacs. Chevy went to ball joints in 1955, but Pontiac stuck with the tried-and-true kingpins through 1957 if I remember correctly.
i barley go over 65 in the car i just keep a 55-60 mph pace. now that you say that i dont think it did, the car never sits i drive it every day. when it starts shaking it shakes the whole car not just the wheel.
the year was about 1965 - i just finished puting a 10,000 pound Hemi in a 34 ford PU - took my bride for a ride on the freeway - just cruisen when all of a sudden i had the dredded death wobble - i got her slowed down to maybe 5/10 MPH? when all the studs snapped on the left front - that tire & wheel rolled straight down the middle of the freeway for what seemed like for ever - no harm done other than maybe my ego & a long walk -checked the tire later & it was out of balance really bad - tom
hey jay, could be a number of things but one thing i didnt see anyone ask is where do you feel the wobble? is it in the steering wheel? body of the car? front or back? i have a pair of radials off the front of my poncho sitting in my garage if you wanna swap your front tires out and take it down the road. they are good tires so it could help alignments wont do anything but correct a steering issue. all an alignment does is point your wheels forward so it tracks right. your stuff may feel tight by hand but be loose under load. i say try to rock the car side to side when its sitting and see if anything moves funny or makes an awful noise also, i know you repacked your wheel bearings. if they are ball bearings its a ***** to get the preload right on those and ive heard people blowing them up after a thousand miles or less
just caught that...what could have happened is when you lowered your car the pinion angle was too much between the trans and rear end and you threw your driveline out of balance and probably fried the ujoints. i did the same thing to my skylark in 2003 when i tried to put rivi springs in the back to get it up a bit. that would cause the whole car to vibrate and kinda resonate at certain speed ranges and not others. felt like my *** was on an old washing machine
Are you kidding? You KNOW the front end is shot, and you're asking why there's a "death wobble"? You'd be better off letting eveybody know when and where you'll be driving this thing, so those of us who actually maintain a car can avoid you. Stop typing. Fix it already. Brian
i maintain my car quite well, but i dont have the funds to fix it rite now, you wanna give me 600 dollars for the front end rebuild kit?? im just trying to see if there is anything else i can do to help get me by untill i have the money.
Just find the worst loose part and fix that. Keep fixing stuff one at a time until you fix the wobble or run out of money.
so a update went and had my tires re-balenced, the previous tire shop that i had it done at didnt put 5 ounces of weight on the out side, on eather side, and they didnt put and sick waights to make up for it. while the tires where off i checked the king pins and they are good! thank god, but im still gonna get the rebuild kit for the front end
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