Steering judders like off balance washing machine

After a long bush trip on rough roads I have got a problem with the steering of my 2-door V8 classic that sometimes starts to judder like an off-balance washing machine.

The steering problem comes every now and again when I hit a small bump and stops when I hit the brakes. When I am stationary the steering wheel appears to be quite firm though there seems to be more play in the steering wheel than usual.

My wife reckons it is probably not a good idea to keep driving with no control over the steering so am trying to figure out what part of the steering system could be the problem?

check for play in the track rod bushes, all the bushes on steering parts for that matter and also ball joints and renew/change where necessary..

Swivel bearing pre-load is one of the most common causes for this.. but it could be many things.

"Swivel bearing pre-load is one of the most common causes..."

Thanks. Good to know I'm not the only nut who has run into this problem

To be honest, driving a RRC/ Discovery 1/ Defender with correctly set swivels and hub bearings is like a breath of fresh air! I'd say the vast majority of these vehicles need to have the work done nowadays.. a tiny bit of 'rock' at the wheel makes such a big difference to the drive.
Unfortunately, most people just put it down to the age/ type of the vehicle and it's easy to forget how nicely they drove when new :car:

This happened to a mate and to me in our RRC's it was the steering damper, as when I went over a bump it would shake the steering and the damper isn't doing its job just transmitting it through the steering, could be accentuated by loose joints ect but that's my personal experience

Steering damper.

But while you're crawling around the front end it would be sensible to check all the usual ball joints, bearings and linkages.

i've had a couple of classics in the past that developed the same thing, mine were sorted out by :

check steering box backlash for the play - adjustment is simple
and vibration on bumps... new steering damper.

Crawled underneath for a bit of a look and found steering damper and most of the ball joints seem to be ok but there is play in the top joint of the drop arm that according to this diagram connects the steering box to the drag link in front of the axle. Could that be the cause of the problem?

How did you check the damper, did you take it off and try and compress it ?

How did you check the damper, did you take it off and try and compress it

Nope

Looks like I need to do this, as all I did was look to see if I could see any dints in the cylinder or damaged bushes then tried to shake whatever I could get a hold of to see if anything would budge that nothing did apart from the top joint of the drop arm

windhorse said:

How did you check the damper, did you take it off and try and compress it

Nope

Looks like I need to do this, as all I did was look to see if I could see any dints in the cylinder or damaged bushes then tried to shake whatever I could get a hold of to see if anything would budge that nothing did apart from the top joint of the drop arm

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The top joint could be causing it it definitely won't help but might aswell check the damper my mate changed all his joints and bushes trying to get rid I it and in the end it was the damper, if there is no pressure resisting you when you compress it of very little the damper is shot

The thing about the damper is, it only masks problems. As I understand it, it's only there to stop the steering violently whipping round when hitting obstacles off-road. If there's vibration or knock coming through the car, something must be loose or out of adjustment.
There is such little movement through the damper while you're holding the steering wheel steady, it cannot possibly have that much affect- we're talking a mm or so movement..

Luckily the dampers are very cheap to buy (in the UK, anyway) so won't hurt to replace, but a well set-up car with correct alignment etc would be perfect with no damper at all on anything but the harshest off-road track..

Steering rattle after going over a bump in the road is usually down to hub swivel pins.

Oddly enough the juddering starts when I hit a small bump but rarely a big one and seems to happen more on tarmac than on dirt. It starts as a small judder and if not stopped by braking builds up to a more serious judder that has its own momentum like a swing moving in a bigger and bigger arc - quite disturbing and definitely needs to be fixed. Fortunately got home before realizing how serious it is.

windhorse said:

Oddly enough the juddering starts when I hit a small bump but rarely a big one and seems to happen more on tarmac than on dirt. It starts as a small judder and if not stopped by braking builds up to a more serious judder that has its own momentum like a swing moving in a bigger and bigger arc - quite disturbing and definitely needs to be fixed. Fortunately got home before realizing how serious it is.

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As i and others have said take a look at the hub swivels. Used to get it on a Disco around 50 mph can be quite violent.

take a look at the hub swivels

thanks, will do

+1 swivels

When you mentioned movement at the top of the drop arm, I presume the arm is not moving relative to the shaft coming out of the bottom of the steering box, but you are seeing some play in the box itself? I think I am right in saying some rotational play in the box is normal by design, as long as the excess is adjusted out.

It was the steering damper on mine.

When i took it off there was little or no damping action, but then I got it upright and pumped it through its full travel a few times and it improved considerably.

Pete

presume the arm is not moving relative to the shaft coming out of the bottom of the steering box

unfortunately the arm is moving relative to the shaft coming out of the bottom of the steering box - at least enough that I can move the arm up and down a little whereas all the other parts of the steering system seem to be rock solid - maybe not the steering damper that I can understand I need to remove in order to find out if it is playing up or not

meanwhile have tried with the help of Mr Haynes to locate the hub swivel pins but not found them yet.