Suspension gremlins

[Diesel Spectre]

I’ve exhausted my ability and need to be “pointed “ in a worthwhile direction.
I’ve been chasing suspension/ steering gremlins for years. I’d replace the next likely culprit and…. Nothing changed. I’m grasping at straws here so what say the conglomerate of knowledge and experience?
2010 e70. Always feels like I’m driving in a hurricane even when it’s not windy. Started by replacing the front lower control arms and torsion struts. No change. Time went by and I replaced the rear ball joints and integral links. Still nope. More time went by and I had enough so I replaced tires…. Nada. Got tired of it since it started making a banging noise any time I go over rough road. At this point, I decide to do the front tension strut bushing and replace them with turner monoballs. Same story. Last week I ordered new rear ball joints & integral links, and new front upper & lower control arms. Got into it today and I can’t find anything wrong with those parts.
This whole time, I would jack up the x5, shake the wheels up & down and left & right and find no play. Move everything around with a pry bar and get slight movement from rubber bushes but nothing out of the ordinary.
I’m on 18s and its 100% not predictable regardless of road condition so it’s not trammeling.
The shocks and struts are likely original but since it’s not a macphearson strut, it shouldn’t cause this issue.
Anyone have any ideas? I’m open to any / all suggestions.

[Diesel Spectre]

It’s so bad at this point that i actually pulled the front toe in to add some pre load to the steering. It’s made it tolerable but it’s not a solution. Forgot to mention that I did all the tie rods as well a few months back and also, no change.

[andrewwynn]

I had a very very similar problem.

I would actually get wobble in the steering wheel on certain roads and it was absolutely repeatable.

Then one day after replacing pretty much all the things you mentioned, I was doing a string alignment and had my buddy turn the wheel for me to get it at 12:00 position and adjust the toe until the wheel was .15° toe in. When he turns the wheel I heard a pretty subtle yet clear bump.

I put my hand on the steering rack and had him turn the wheel back and forth: sure enough a tiny bit of play in three rack.

All the exact symptoms of worn ball joint on the sideways control arm (front axle behind the axle). Makes enough sense; does the exact same thing from the front of axle to steer the knuckle.

With wheels on the ground for resistance use a mechanic stethoscope and listen to the rack for backlash in the gearing.

[Diesel Spectre]

That is exactly what I didn’t want to hear. The rack is the only thing left but holy crap is it expensive. A rack, new struts, & both nox sensors would almost be the replacement value of the e70. Haha. We won’t even mention the DPF …
I’ve been looking at the “f chassis” X5ds, but I honestly prefer the e70. I’m sure the n57 in the “f”s is ok statistically but some of the “advancements “ made over the m57 don’t inspire confidence in reliability. Timing chains to name one.
I’ve been avoiding the rack because with both front axle wheels up or on the ground, I get no perceived play. Touch the wheel & both front wheels move. You’re right though, that’s not a proper level of diagnosis given everything I’ve done so far and the remaining symptoms.

[Diesel Spectre]

Interestingly, I doesn’t want to return to center while driving. If I’m rolling slowly in a parking lot, I will hit a point where it will actually start to pull all the way to lock. In other words, if I turn the wheel half way to the lock while rolling, it will finish the turn for me. Like it’s returning to center but the wrong direction. Points to camber (upper control arms) but I find no excessive wear in the rubber mounts or the ball joints and camber isn’t adjustable. Hasn’t been in an accident.

[Diesel Spectre]

Maybe I’ll just do a string alignment today, pull the front wheels off and put an angle finder on the hub to check. I do have a set of Myele HD upper control arms so if camber is way out, I’ll install next weekend. The uppers in this thing are a lot of work. No good way to get to the nuts without removing the dme and abs block.

[Diesel Spectre]

I got tired of fighting with it and replaced the front shocks with Bilstein B6s. New top mounts, polyurethane “upper & lower doughnuts”, dust covers, lower control arms (again) , sway bar end links (meyle HDs), new tie rods & a new Bosch rack & pinion. It took me roughly 3 days (half of which was spent trying to get the steering shaft universal off the pinion input splines).
It is much improved but now that the slop is out I still have a definite (unpredictable) change in “yaw” as I drive which is worse at higher speeds. Still, 90% if the issues are gone.
When I get another chance, I’ll do the front upper control arms with adjustable meyle HDs.
I also have to sort the rear shocks. I have 3rd row seating and rear air ride. Apparently Bilstein B6s aren’t available for this setup. I’m considering getting the B6s for the standard “spring “ suspension and sending it, but I’m not sure if that will cause issues down the road. It looks like the air ride setup differs only in the rear shock upper mount (it’s a little taller). So with a factory air ride shorter travel, it should work just fine. Still doing research on this so advice is welcome.
I have everything to do the rear control arms and shocks except the actual shocks and the actual control arms. I’m thinking of getting adjustable arms for the rear but this is my daily (on NJ roads) so reliability is paramount. I’d like to take some camber out of the rear though as it’s too extreme for my taste. Yes, it’s fun”er” in the turns but I have other cars for that crap that don’t weigh half as much as the x5. I tend to take it conservatively in the turns. Merging into traffic or 40-80mph runs, not so conservative… I’ve had this thing for almost 10 years and I’m still impressed with the highway power and drivability. It just pulls like a little, rubber wheeled freight train. I digress…
Any advice for tightening up the last 10% of “jeep-ness” in the steering/suspension?

[andrewwynn]

More toe in usually fixes wandering yaw at the expense of faster tire wear.

On my e53 I used a 3/32 spacer under the string on the front of both front and rear wheels and that worked well even when I had a worn steering rack

[Diesel Spectre]

Originally Posted by andrewwynn

More toe in usually fixes wandering yaw at the expense of faster tire wear.

On my e53 I used a 3/32 spacer under the string on the front of both front and rear wheels and that worked well even when I had a worn steering rack

Yeah, that’s exactly where I’m coming from. Substantially increased toe to take out the jeep-ness. I don’t like it. It’s not confidence inspiring on the highway. I’m sure there will be some trammeling remaining when all is said and done as these are notorious for it. It just feels so unsettled like it’s windy but no wind.
It may be front upper control arms but I see no wear in the ball joints and the rubber is intact.
It may be the rear lower ball joints but I find no play when I take it apart.
It may be rear lower trailing arm bushings but again, I can’t see anything visually when I use a prybar to move thing around.
It also may be rear upper control arms. Same thing. Nothing stands out as “sloppy” when I shake and move things around.

Without a definitive process for finding such a vague problem, I’m going to keep throwing parts at the steering & suspension. Not necessarily as a diagnostic step although it will help me to isolate what symptoms are associated with whichever part was replaced last. It’s more a matter of wanting to keep the vehicle for a while longer and just deciding that all the steering & suspension has 200k miles so a total refresh is likely the most reliable path forward.

[andrewwynn]

I never had tramlining with e53 or with my now e70. I did run my e53 toe in about 0.15° and only with the worn out rack and certain road crown inflection would have a problem. The wheel would actually wobble.

The wobble is a good way to check for loose control arm;

Drive about 60-70 on the center lane of 3-lane highway so you are on the top of the crown and every so gently s-curve back and forth om in your lane. Hold the wheel with just finger-thumb as lightly as you can.

If your rear control arms or ball joint are worn the wheel will be indecisive as you cross over from slight left to slight right. The wheels will shimmy like a bad shipping cart and you'll feel 2-3 wiggles while the tires flip from left bias to right bias.

I've never seen a similar wobble from worn tension strut even when so worn that the wheels pulled back 3/4" when hitting the brakes!

The rear wheels set too close to straight can cause the same indecisive yaw so I ran them 0.15° toe in as well.

I'm getting exceptionally good wear on my e70 and I haven't bothered to check the toe but before some joint wears out I better so I know where to set them back. The e70 has much more complicated suspension not looking forward to figuring out what the hell is broken when I start having problems.

How's the wear on rear tires? The outer bushing on the rear control arm and the rose bush are the common failure points and allow the wheels to steer toe out under braking and tie in under acceleration and it's the main cause of inner edge tire wear but can easily cause the wondering yaw you described; especially if you feel the car "get light in the corner" on a off throttle condition. (it will feel like suddenly you have some oversteer). That often comes from loose rear rear control arms.