Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Would a broken tie rod...?

Not likely. It would probably leave the road “at it’s earliest convenience”.....just like our Ram did during hunting season this year! memtb

Sort of off topic - saw a car dog tracking so bad last fall, the front tires were a good 6 inches to the left of the rear. I've never seen a car move down the road with that much tweak.

I don't know how the rubber stayed on the rim.

Pretty rare occurrence you see any dog tracking anymore on passenger vehicles it seems.

You weren't a teenager in the '80s and no one would confuse you with being a hottie!

Will add a personal story... about failed tie rods!

I once had a nice 84 Toyota FJ60 with ~160K miles which was my daily driver at the time. It was aggressively maintained and I had made several trips between Kansas and Utah w/o incident. I also used as my regular hunting and fishing vehicle in Kansas for ~4 years. In the spring of 2000, I made a ~1200 mile round trip 4 day adventure from Kansas to Minnesota to get some custom work done on a Scamp trailer that I had at the time. No issues and mostly freeway driving. When I returned home, I backed the trailer into the driveway and ran in to see the wife and kids. An hour or so later, I jumped back into the 'cruiser to move the trailer to where we stored it and couldn't get the wheels to respond to the steering when trying to back it up further. I had no clue what was going on! Irritated after a minute of trying to figure out what I was missing, I stepped out and looked under the vehicle... there were both tie rod ends sitting down on the driveway... the threads on the rods/connectors had rusted out!!! So much for my aggressive maintenance! I don't remember how I jerry-rigged to pull it down to the mechanic but that was an ordeal (done late at night!) as well.

My Toyota guy was shocked. He replaced all the tie rod componets, etc. but despite my love for all things "Toyota Landcruiser" at the time, my FJ was sold the next week and I bought a brand new GMC. I loved that 'cruiser but no longer trusted Japanese steel on a 16 year old vehicle. If I were to ever get another one, I would just pony up the $$$ for a full restoration.

As side note, we all have episodes in our lives where it is hard to deny that perhaps we were maybe being looked over by some higher power, ect. This was a personal one for me.

What's a ZJ?

Suspension.......as in struts. My wife’s Aztec did that, years ago. Strut replacement fixed it. They are not much fun to change, either.

ZJ is the 93-98 Grand Cherokee.

Solid front axle coil sprung control arm vehicles can get it.

XJ (Cherokee 83-2001)
WJ (Grand Cherokee 99-2004)
and TJ or newer Wranglers

I had an old K5 Blazer that got a wicked wheel hop going down the highway.
Slowed down and it went away never to return.
Just got into phase after a bump.

Was a wicked hop, up and down.
Not the shake you outta your skull death wobble Jeepers experience.

I put a hitch on a unibody 63 nova wagon against all good advice so I could tow a small boat. Coming down a hill I popped the brakes a little hard and one of the stabilizers pulled out of the mounting bracket. The steering wheel damn near broke my thumbs and the car did a 180 wrapping the trailer tongue around the rear bumper then slammed into the guardrail. Boat launched out onto the double yellow lines and stopped. Always check your bushings. Don't tow with a puny vehicle, either.

Not Death Wobble, if you have ever experienced Death Wobble you won't make it seconds, and it isn't pretty. Not a broken tie rod either, I can tell you those don't go well.

Death wobble.

Wow, you guys sure nailed it with that Death Wobble. I'd sure never heard about that before. Not that I've ever owned a Jeep anything considering all the issues that my brother-in-law had with his Wagoneers; yes, more than one. I read Consumer Reports April auto issues every year and Jeeps get high marks for initial quality, but thumbs down for predicted reliability.