those locknuts are standard though right? as in I can pick them up at home depot or Ace hardware? and when you say a real pain to R&R you mean dropping the steering linkage and prying them out of the front brackets?

 

They're metric, about 30mm if I recall correctly. Can't remember the thread pitch.
The whole thing can be a PITA. I've had them come out and go in easily, others I've had to wrestle with.

 

can any shop with a press do those bushings or do they need any special tools?

 

any shop should be able to press the bushins as long as they have a press. I agree with Tom those are a one use nut on the radius arms. I would just replace the frame bushings while I had it apart but thats my opinion. It took me about 3 hours to change my radius arm bushings if that help you at all. Mine were a PITA

 

well tightened up the swivel pins last week however I did order new bearings, washers and shims to renew the upper pins and will redo those in a few days. today I pulled the radius arms and the panhard rod off and had all new bushings pressed in, took it for a test drive at about 50 MPH and everything seemed really good, I drove a route that I was sure I would get my death wobble on and didn't get it once! I definitely hit at least a dozen bumps that should have set it off and the steering felt as tight and smooth as the day I bought the truck 2 years ago! hopefully tightening up those swivel pins to 15 Lbs each will make it feel better than new (they are at about 12 each or so now) I will try to get some pictures when I do the pins for a write up.

PS getting the radius arms out was pretty easy had to pry one side a bit, but getting them back in was pretty tough finally got them lined up.

 

[quote=Rover Chris;213444]While under there I checked my ball joints and bushings, ball joints are good and the panhard rod bushing at the drivers side (frame side) is shot, this sucks because I just replaced both of those bushings in July (I guess PS fluid leak and wobble destroyed it again) PS fluid leak is being worked on as well, the radius arms flex a little side to side right at the axle, the bushings in the back that mount to the frame look solid.quote]

ATF can cause the rubber to swell and deteriate quickly. Good luck with the leak. I had to change my rubber swaybar bushings on my Jeep every 4 months because the ATF from the PS gearbox was causing them to swell and fall apart. Finally replaced them with Polyurethane and fixed the leaky gearbox.

 

Good deal at least you got it figured out... How hard was it changing the shims??

 

I haven't changed the shims yet but I did remove a few just to hold me over (and to determine if there were other issues) all in all it wasn't bad. The biggest problem was re-tightening the bolts, I snapped 2 and stretched 2 (glad I picked up four new ones) my torque wrench has to be straight to click off and it doesn't take much over tightening to break those bolts, and with a big torque wrench I sometimes forget how much extra torque I am actually applying. anyways had to remove the hard brake line first time around. The pin bolts are really tight to initially break free but with the brake line out of the way a breaker bar or large ratchet works well. Someone on here at some point mentioned slotting the brake line bracket, I decided to attack it with a hack saw since I knew I would be redoing this in a week anyways, an extra few minutes will save me from having to bleed the brakes if I ever have to remove them again (you will see when I have pictures of it). The pin did not seat right back down like I would have liked it to so I had to line it up and use the bolts to drive it down into the housing each time, and then from there it is tighten the pin and measure the preload until you have the right amount/thickness of shims in to bring the preload into spec (I think I removed all but the largest shim on each side and ended up around 12 or 13 pounds, I will set it to 15 on each side with the new parts), I could have tightened it up to where I wanted it but I figured getting the new bearings, washers, and shims should hopefully set me up for the rest of the time I own the truck, although I would love to own the truck long enough to need new ones . all in all I would say knowing what I am doing now I can do it in about an hour or two for both sides, but first time around and breaking bolts turned it into an all day project. The good side to my screw up though is I got to actually tear down the whole thing and see inside of the swivel so if I ever need to do anything in there I now know what to expect!

 

I had the death wobble for the longest time. Had my LR mechanic look at it and what fixed it is we replaced the sterring wheel dampner and tightened the wheel bearings. All good now.

 

not sure how long you have been without it but if it comes back I have a few suggestions.

on a side note, replacing the steering damper does not resolve death wobble (even though LR suggests you replace it when you have death wobble) however it will absorb it quite a bit, possibly enough to make people think its gone. The wheel bearings on the other hand can be a common culprit.

the biggest factor that I have learned about dealing with death wobble (this was my second battle with it, first being in an 87 Cherokee as a kid) is that there is no specific cause for it, it is due to slack in the system, and that can be anywhere, or multiple places. whatever the actual cause is there is one fact that you face and that is finding the problem can be a major PITA!