2021 gladiator death wobble

[ShadowsPapa]

I'm considering moving from Tacoma to Gladiator Rubicon. Has anyone done a poll on how many have had the wobble problem? It seems that if it was common enough, since it could be dangerous NTSA would require a recall.

It's really not common at all. It LOOKS like it is because the internet is a hospital of sorts where people gather to talk about sick vehicles. It's not representative at all.
It's the sort of thing that can and has affected many vehicles- including FORD and others. It's most common with vehicles that have been modified - and by that I mean changes in wheels, lifts and other components, or where there's wear or damaged parts. You can't do a recall over that sort of thing. There's no single cause, nothing to recall over - recall and do what? Replace the vehicle?
The percentage is extremely small.
I've never had it happen on a Jeep. I have had it happen on a Ford - after 70,000-some miles.
Recalls are for when there's a known flaw. I'd bet out of 1,000 Gladiators sold you'd likely not find a single instance. You'd have to have a much larger sampling.

Go back and read all the tech stuff that's been posted, the comments I've posted from a rally racer and another from a suspension engineer. This is not a common thing on unmodified vehicles at all.
And it's not a Jeep problem.

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[Tuggernuts]

It's really not common at all. It LOOKS like it is because the internet is a hospital of sorts where people gather to talk about sick vehicles. It's not representative at all.
It's the sort of thing that can and has affected many vehicles- including FORD and others. It's most common with vehicles that have been modified - and by that I mean changes in wheels, lifts and other components, or where there's wear or damaged parts. You can't do a recall over that sort of thing. There's no single cause, nothing to recall over - recall and do what? Replace the vehicle?
The percentage is extremely small.
I've never had it happen on a Jeep. I have had it happen on a Ford - after 70,000-some miles.
Recalls are for when there's a known flaw. I'd bet out of 1,000 Gladiators sold you'd likely not find a single instance. You'd have to have a much larger sampling.

Go back and read all the tech stuff that's been posted, the comments I've posted from a rally racer and another from a suspension engineer. This is not a common thing on unmodified vehicles at all.
And it's not a Jeep problem.

I’ve had a CJ7, a YJ, two TJ’s, a JK, and a JT, all were modified in one way or another, never had death wobble on any of them. You’re exactly right about bringing issues to the Internet.

 

[Jeeperjamie]

I'm considering moving from Tacoma to Gladiator Rubicon. Has anyone done a poll on how many have had the wobble problem? It seems that if it was common enough, since it could be dangerous NTSA would require a recall.

You will hear about it on hear because it's a forum and that's what a lot of people do, jump on a forum to complain. It's few and far as to how many get it but if you read on this forum long enough you will hear about more happy people than people who are displeased. That's the way it is in most forum. For what's it's worth the wife and I have decided to sell our 2016 BMW X5 50i and Build a 4 door Ford Bronco, I'm not getting ride of my Gladiator for one but I'll part ways with BMW for one, especially after we drove one today that had the 2.7 Liter engine in it. It's got a lot of pep on 35's. We built one out for around $45,000 that had everything she wanted on it and few things I liked as well.

 

[seven30]

Anyone experience the DW on iced roads? We just had a little ice storm here. If this had happened on ice I dont think it would have ended so well.

Consider millions of live axle vehicles were manufactured BEFORE we had hydraulic dampers and functioned just fine.
-----
Dear NHTSA,
We manufacture vehicles that have an uncontrollable steering wobble which can cause loss of control. But don't worry, we installed a damper to hide it.
-----

Im dropping it off Monday at SouthPoint Jeep in Austin tx for inspection. My fear is they will just swap out the damper and try to run out the clock on warranty.

 

[ShadowsPapa]

Ford has experienced death wobble. Although "the internet" says this involved Ford F250 and F350 trucks since 2005, I say bull crap - my 1995 experienced similar at 70,000 miles or so. By that time there's a lot of wear, bushings likely need attention, worn tie rods, perhaps damaged/bent/worn parts and more. It's talked about in the Ford world almost as much as in the Jeep world.

And this is from a Ford site -
---------------
As per the lawsuit, the death wobble is associated with premature wear or loosening of the track bar joint, control arms, shocks, or a finicky steering dampener. This is more of an overview as to what can happen and most cases generally have either one or a combination of one or more defects as the cause.

Apart from these, many mechanics have found other causes like worn out tie rod bushings of the control arms, tire wear, warped brake rotors, alignment, and worn parts on the front end like suspension and steering linkages to cause death wobble.

Solutions include stuff like checking the track bar joint for excessive play and overall checkup of loose nuts and bolts. Other minor fixes include checking and replacing the bottom pivot joint, outer tie rod bushings.
--------------

People say "I checked for loose parts".
OK, I'll bite - did you have a sheet showing the torque specs for every nut and bolt associated with steering and suspension and use a quality torque wrench that is known to be accurate and check TORQUE, or did you take wrenches under there and push or pull and come out saying yeah, they are tight? Your tight may not be close to a torque spec of 150 pound/ft. for example.
Did you have someone wiggle the steering wheel back and forth, engine OFF, while you felt every joint for movement? You really can't do it alone. I've done alignments and steering/suspension repairs since I did it to work my way through college and it's almost always a buddy system unless a joint has obvious wear. A lot of things can't easily be seen, but hands-on the joint, you can feel it - if you can feel it but not see it, it's still bad.

------------
https://www.torquenews.com/4316/fixing-death-wobble-in-jeep-steering-wheel-not-fix
------------------
Seems the link above agrees with some of what's been posted - some of it from Norm Layton, some from design engineers (of course then you get "I know more than engineers do").
In case people wonder who the heck was that guy ->

Owner Sweptline Products
Crew Chief, 4540 Motorsports
Dodge Power Wagon Restoration and Jeep modification.
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4540 Motorsports
2013 - Present 9 years
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Leader, organizer, manager, strategy planner, suspension specialist.
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Sweptline Products
2000 - 2015 15 years
Walnut, CA

And yet with suspension experts and extremely experienced people who specialize in such things, it's always "dampener fixed it". (see link to article above - they explain that)

Anyone experience the DW on iced roads? We just had a little ice storm here. If this had happened on ice I dont think it would have ended so well.

Extremely unlikely under those conditions. From what I've read, friction forces are required - why it happens on pavement in every case I've seen (could be exceptions on gravel but I've not seen any)

 

[Challenger85]

You will hear about it on hear because it's a forum and that's what a lot of people do, jump on a forum to complain. It's few and far as to how many get it but if you read on this forum long enough you will hear about more happy people than people who are displeased. That's the way it is in most forum. For what's it's worth the wife and I have decided to sell our 2016 BMW X5 50i and Build a 4 door Ford Bronco, I'm not getting ride of my Gladiator for one but I'll part ways with BMW for one, especially after we drove one today that had the 2.7 Liter engine in it. It's got a lot of pep on 35's. We built one out for around $45,000 that had everything she wanted on it and few things I liked as well.

Lol a Bronco huh? Sasquatch and a 2.7? You’ll have to choose a soft top, big bend, 2.3L no option version at the biggest dealer in America waiting to slap on 10K ADM otherwise you won’t see that thing for 12 more years. Plus they just announced more shutdowns across 8 lines for chips. Thousands of built Broncos stuck in a lot right now with angry customers. I’m not understating how poorly they’re ran, I promise. I’m still seeing day 1-2 reservations get passed up so a huge dealer in Michigan can fill an order someone placed last week. Choose wisely, get everything in writing first and ask them what their allocation is, it’s based on sales.

We’ve been waiting for the Bronco we reserved since August 2020 and the dealer is telling us it’ll probably be a 2023 because, “we don’t have enough allocation.”

I hate Ford and I laughed when i saw their stock dropped.

 

[Challenger85]

OP traded in a Jeep for a Jeep? I don’t understand that but whatever makes you happy. Sorry about your gladiator being a POS.

 

[Jeeperjamie]

Lol a Bronco huh? Sasquatch and a 2.7? You’ll have to choose a soft top, big bend, 2.3L no option version at the biggest dealer in America waiting to slap on 10K ADM otherwise you won’t see that thing for 12 more years. Plus they just announced more shutdowns across 8 lines for chips. Thousands of built Broncos stuck in a lot right now with angry customers. I’m not understating how poorly they’re ran, I promise. I’m still seeing day 1-2 reservations get passed up so a huge dealer in Michigan can fill an order someone placed last week. Choose wisely, get everything in writing first and ask them what their allocation is, it’s based on sales.

We’ve been waiting for the Bronco we reserved since August 2020 and the dealer is telling us it’ll probably be a 2023 because, “we don’t have enough allocation.”

I hate Ford and I laughed when i saw their stock dropped.

Already got everything in writing, had a buddy build one middle of October and he took delivery if his last week. The key to building them is if your looking for the leather, and all the safety features, Badlands etc, those re the ones being held up. We built a base 4 door and adding a few options, final price $45,357 plus tax when we take delivery, they said probably June, I'm good with that. I've saw at least 5 on the lot that were build around August or Sept of last year that over the past 6 weeks have been delivered and they ain't marking them up like some dealerships. My buddy paid what he paid for his, around $47,000.

For reference we did get a hardtop with ours ,Base model 2022, with Sasquatch package, $695 option for this year not sure about last year's model. Like i said we don't have the safety package or leather or a lot of the bells and whistles but got the skid plates, front steel bumper with the brush guard and 4.7 gears. I talked with a few guys up at RTR racing and they suggested how to go about building one, they have been getting them pretty much as quick as 8 weeks turn around up there but we are talking about Vaughn Gittin Jr.

 

[DailyMoparGuy]

.

Already got everything in writing, had a buddy build one middle of October and he took delivery if his last week. The key to building them is if your looking for the leather, and all the safety features, Badlands etc, those re the ones being held up. We built a base 4 door and adding a few options, final price $45,357 plus tax when we take delivery, they said probably June, I'm good with that. I've saw at least 5 on the lot that were build around August or Sept of last year that over the past 6 weeks have been delivered and they ain't marking them up like some dealerships. My buddy paid what he paid for his, around $47,000.

Congrats on the Bronco. There’s someone at my building that just got a 4-door First Edition. I can’t imagine how much they paid for it, but it sure is pretty in that Cactus Gray. I couldn’t stop staring at it haha.

 

[Challenger85]

Already got everything in writing, had a buddy build one middle of October and he took delivery if his last week. The key to building them is if your looking for the leather, and all the safety features, Badlands etc, those re the ones being held up. We built a base 4 door and adding a few options, final price $45,357 plus tax when we take delivery, they said probably June, I'm good with that. I've saw at least 5 on the lot that were build around August or Sept of last year that over the past 6 weeks have been delivered and they ain't marking them up like some dealerships. My buddy paid what he paid for his, around $47,000.

Yeah, your buddy is a perfect example of why Ford can get fucked. Part constraints are only part of it though, it’s down to the dealer you choose. Like I said, I know people who want base 4 doors who reserved the first few days they opened last July and they’ve never even previewed for a build. I’ve also seen loaded 2 door Badland orders in December already have vins, yet here my wife sits waiting. First they see how many Broncos they can give each dealership, than they look at what they can build. Either way, good luck. The 2.7L likes to blow up in the Bronco, we ordered it too but some of the posts are unnerving.

 

[Challenger85]

.

Congrats on the Bronco. There’s someone at my building that just got a 4-door First Edition. I can’t imagine how much they paid for it, but it sure is pretty in that Cactus Gray. I couldn’t stop staring at it haha.

About 60K

 

[ShadowsPapa]

Lol a Bronco huh? Sasquatch and a 2.7? You’ll have to choose a soft top, big bend, 2.3L no option version at the biggest dealer in America waiting to slap on 10K ADM otherwise you won’t see that thing for 12 more years. Plus they just announced more shutdowns across 8 lines for chips. Thousands of built Broncos stuck in a lot right now with angry customers. I’m not understating how poorly they’re ran, I promise. I’m still seeing day 1-2 reservations get passed up so a huge dealer in Michigan can fill an order someone placed last week. Choose wisely, get everything in writing first and ask them what their allocation is, it’s based on sales.

We’ve been waiting for the Bronco we reserved since August 2020 and the dealer is telling us it’ll probably be a 2023 because, “we don’t have enough allocation.”

I hate Ford and I laughed when i saw their stock dropped.

Did you see what Ford is doing to their dealerships? Any dealer caught marking up a vehicle above MSRP is getting their allocations cut. (well, any that's caught, that is)
So if you run into a dealer that Ford has punished for marking vehicles above MSRP, you may be waiting a very very long time.
That was in a major auto rag article last week, head of Ford himself said that.

 

[Challenger85]

Did you see what Ford is doing to their dealerships? Any dealer caught marking up a vehicle above MSRP is getting their allocations cut. (well, any that's caught, that is)
So if you run into a dealer that Ford has punished for marking vehicles above MSRP, you may be waiting a very very long time.
That was in a major auto rag article last week, head of Ford himself said that.

I did not see that! There has been some awful ADM going on from people on that forum. 5-10-15-20-30K from dealers, some came down and still got money. Some removed it and some even told Ford to piss off and sold the vehicle to someone else. Ford handed out “priority” orders to some of those people to get another Bronco built from a different dealer. I’ll believe it when I see it though. Ford also said they would be built in timestamp order and that’s not absolutely not happening. They also said they would institute a name match policy to make sure they went to reservation holders. Than they lowered it to like 60% for 2022 after it was supposed to be 90% I believe. I’ll check out the article though, thanks. After everything I’ve gone through with them since August 2020, I just have nothing nice to say about them.

 

[ShadowsPapa]

This one has it worded "unreasonable gouging" so maybe he only cares if the dealer marks something up 30K instead of only 15K?

It's worded slightly different from the one I saw so this could be more accurate -

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/com...who-gouge-could-get-fewer-vehicles/ar-AATs7Qm

 

[Challenger85]

For reference we did get a hardtop with ours ,Base model 2022, with Sasquatch package, $695 option for this year not sure about last year's model. Like i said we don't have the safety package or leather or a lot of the bells and whistles but got the skid plates, front steel bumper with the brush guard and 4.7 gears. I talked with a few guys up at RTR racing and they suggested how to go about building one, they have been getting them pretty much as quick as 8 weeks turn around up there but we are talking about Vaughn Gittin Jr.

I saw you edited this after I replied. Yeah, that’s why lol and that’s why Ford sucks. They turned their backs on their customers they promised reservation order builds too.

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