tass

Hi, I have an '07 JK 4door, just noticed when I have it in 4WD and take tight turns at slow speeds, i.e tight turn in a parking lot or doiung a u turn, that my front end wobbles/skips/feels like its about to fall off ! It becomes very difficult to turn. I don't think this is the "death wobble" I've read about. It happens in drive and reverse. Also it happens on dry roads but also wet roads, not sure about in the snow as I haven't tried this yet.

In 2 WD mode it handles perfectly, absolutely no problem at low or high speed.

Can anyone shed light on this for me? I'm a relatively new jeeper and have not heard of this. Is this normal ? A quick glance underneath doesn't show anything to be loose or broken... but I'm not a mechanic.

Help ? Advice? I'd love to get an understanding of this before going to the dealership.

Tass:

mkjeep

Uh, it's gonna do that unless there is loose terrain underneath it. Not trying to be sarcastic, but you may wanna read your owners manual in the 4wd section, do's and do not's.

jason0341

That is because all your doing is grabbing asphalt! 4wd is not made to do u-turns in the parking lot bro! You will tear up your t-case!

tass

Thanks guys, appreciate the info. The 4WD thing is new to me, glad there isn't anything wrong.

mkjeep

Check out the Off-Road 101 threads, alotta useful info in there. Happy Jeepin!

Mark Doiron

You've already been given good advice on this: Don't do it because it'll damage your running gear! The reason why is because, just like you have a differential on each axle, you need a differential between the axles when in 4WD. If you don't have such a differential (you don't), then you must use 4WD only on slippery surfaces--snow, rocks (which invariably have enough sand on them), sand, etc. The reason for this is because when you're turning each tire travels a slightly different distance. That's easy to imagine if you consider the inside tire and the outside tire on a single axle. But, the same thing is happening between the front a rear axles--all four tires will travel different distances. The differentials on each axle will compensate for that between the wheels on that axle, but there's no differential on a Jeep to compensate for it between the two axles. So, no 4Wd on hard, non-slippery surfaces (this can include rain covered surfaces, BTW). Finally, a vehicle that does have a center differential is usually referred to as AWD or All Wheel Drive. I hope that helps!

bubba2u

yep, as stated above. i dont use 4wd unless im off road.