Insane Body Roll

[Jeff St John]

My wife and I recently purchased a 2012 LR4. Currently has 88k miles. Had the front and rear pads and rotors, rear sway bar, and both control arms replaced (which fixed clunking over bumps). Seemed fine when I drove it after getting it back from my local mechanic. However, several days later my wife complained of it having excessive body roll when turning left around corners at speed - say over 35-40 MPH. So I drove it yesterday and the body roll when going around left hand curves in the road is insane - I thought the thing was going to rollover. The Dynamic Stability Control light on the dash blinked while this was happening and the truck automatically started to brake. This does not happen when turning right at speed and did happen before the aforementioned repairs were done - so I’m not really sure what’s going on. I was told OEM parts were used for the sway bar and control arms. My local mechanic is great - a trustworthy guy who’s done lots of work for me on various vehicles through the years. Admitted that he hadn’t worked on too many Land Rovers and I don’t have a lot of other options where I live. Could this be a faulty air strut? This would seem somewhat coincidental. The air suspension otherwise seems to work fine and there’s no loss of height/sagging after the truck has been parked for a while. I appreciate any feedback!

 

[scott schmerge]

My wife and I recently purchased a 2012 LR4. Currently has 88k miles. Had the front and rear pads and rotors, rear sway bar, and both control arms replaced (which fixed clunking over bumps). Seemed fine when I drove it after getting it back from my local mechanic. However, several days later my wife complained of it having excessive body roll when turning left around corners at speed - say over 35-40 MPH. So I drove it yesterday and the body roll when going around left hand curves in the road is insane - I thought the thing was going to rollover. The Dynamic Stability Control light on the dash blinked while this was happening and the truck automatically started to brake. This does not happen when turning right at speed and did happen before the aforementioned repairs were done - so I’m not really sure what’s going on. I was told OEM parts were used for the sway bar and control arms. My local mechanic is great - a trustworthy guy who’s done lots of work for me on various vehicles through the years. Admitted that he hadn’t worked on too many Land Rovers and I don’t have a lot of other options where I live. Could this be a faulty air strut? This would seem somewhat coincidental. The air suspension otherwise seems to work fine and there’s no loss of height/sagging after the truck has been parked for a while. I appreciate any feedback!

Sounds like a sway bar linkage is potentially disconnected. Have you taken a look underneath?

 

[Jeff St John]

Yes - and it all seems intact...

 

[scott schmerge]

Yes - and it all seems intact...

Odd. You’d be getting a suspension fault if it were one of your bags and the truck would definitely be sagging.

 

[Houm_WA]

Not necessarily. My front passenger air bag was at its end of life and there was no fault. One thing you could try is jacking up the rig and seeing if the upper control arms (in front) make contact with the shocks. If so, the shocks are worn out.

 

[Jeff St John]

Ok - thanks - I’ll take a look this week. It just seems odd that this all started after the sway bar and control arms were replaced... seems too coincidental.

 

[scott schmerge]

Not necessarily. My front passenger air bag was at its end of life and there was no fault. One thing you could try is jacking up the rig and seeing if the upper control arms (in front) make contact with the shocks. If so, the shocks are worn out.

Yeah, but he said that the truck stays normal height. And a ‘12 you’d expect the air suspension is still in pretty good shape. If the valve blocks are faulting you’d get a suspension fault. If the bags have a leak (which I’m doubting based on symptoms) you are correct, might not get a fault. But if the leak is big enough, which in this case it’d have to be, you’ll often you’ll get an algorithm based failure.

 

[scott schmerge]

My bet is something has come loose on the front end, based on work recently done. I’d take it back to the mechanic and ask him to go back over everything- if he’s a honest guy and a decent mechanic, hopefully he’ll find the issue and remedy it.

 

[Jeff St John]

Thanks for all the input. My guy is going to check it out for me this week. I’ll let you know the outcome. Thanks again!

 

[djkaosone]

I agree with the others about taking it back for them to double-check their work. Sounds like the right sway bar link is disconnected, if you're leaning hard while turning left.

Not saying that you have this, but I've been dealt with a few of those body roll warning lights before I started seeing suspension faults for "normal height only". Eventually, last weekend, I serviced the air compressor drier with new components and I haven't had any further issues.