AtWhatMileage
Suspension · 15 owner reports

Other suspension problem on the 1999 Jeep Cherokee

2 fires 2 of the 15 reports for this failure mention a crash, a fire, an injury or a death. Those are the owner's words on the complaint form, not a verified finding, and one report can mention more than one.

Only 4 reports for this mode came with an odometer reading, which is too few for percentiles to mean anything. The page is here because someone linked to it; treat the figures as anecdotes, and see the full report for this year instead.

Reports of this failure 15
With an odometer reading 4
Reports per 1,000 built 0.1 per 1,000
Filed below 36,000 miles 25%
Mention a crash, fire or injury 2
Typical repair $350–$2,000
What it means when it happens Moderate
Rank among this year's problems 12th

When other suspension problem gets reported

There are 15 reports of other suspension problem on the 1999 Jeep Cherokee, 4 with a mileage attached. That is too few to place the failure on the odometer with any confidence.

A part like this is normally expected to survive 100,000 miles. It is the 12th most-reported problem on this model year.

The whole distribution

Percentiles of the 4 odometer readings owners gave.
10th25thMedian 75th90th
— — 112,500 miles — —

Read the 10th percentile as “one report in ten arrived this early”. Exact figures are shown in this table because it is the table of record; everywhere else on the site they are rounded to the precision the sample can carry.

What a percentile can and cannot tell you here

These five numbers describe the readings owners gave, in order. The median is the middle one: half the reports arrived below it. The 10th and 90th are the edges of the bulk of the distribution, and the distance between them is the part worth reading. A tight spread — say 70,000 to 95,000 miles — points at something that wears out on a schedule, and the schedule is knowable. A wide one, 20,000 to 190,000, points at a fault that hits some cars and never troubles others, which means the mileage on the listing in front of you tells you very little about your odds.

What these figures are not is a survival curve. Every reading here comes from a car whose owner filed a complaint, so the sample contains only failures: it cannot say what share of the fleet made it past 150,000 miles untouched, because those owners had nothing to report. Nor is the mileage the moment of failure — it is the odometer reading as recalled at the time of filing, which may be weeks later and is sometimes rounded to the nearest ten thousand by the person typing it.

Percentiles are shown at all only once 8 readings exist for the vehicle and mode. Below that the middle of a handful of numbers is noise wearing a decimal point, so the figures are withheld rather than dressed up.

What happens, and what it costs

Of these reports, 2 a fire is mentioned. Owners write their own complaints and the agency does not verify them, so read this as what the reports say happened rather than as a confirmed count.

Putting it right typically runs $350–$2,000 at an independent US shop. That range is an editorial estimate held in this site's failure-mode catalogue, not a figure from NHTSA, and it is a repair cost rather than a diagnosis cost.

The same failure on other years

The same failure is reported on 12 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2020, at a median of 5,000 miles, and latest on the 1996 at 135,000 miles.

By volume the 2014 carries the most reports, with 50; the 1999 has 15. A mode that appears across most years of a model is usually a design choice rather than a bad batch.

If one year stands out to the left, that is the year to avoid; if the whole line sits at a similar mileage, this is wear rather than a defect in one production run.

What owners wrote

Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.

While driving on a highway the posted speed limit, my vehicle started shaking uncontrolably and I had to get off the highway to stop the car so the shaking will stop. I have had a number parts replaced such as the steering stabilizer, and the steering rod. *jb

100,000 miles NHTSA complaint 639322 filed 2007-09-19

I have a 99 jeep cherokee sport. The front end becomes uncontrollable at highway speeds when driven on anything less than perfectly smooth flat roadway surface. Applying the brakes makes the front end shimmy horrible and dangerous. You must slow to regain control, also dangerous on highways. Online research shows this is a common flaw with jeeps that have a coil-sprung front suspension with a track bar or panhard bar, referred to death wobble. This is very dangerous! *tr

33,000 miles NHTSA complaint 870640 filed 2011-07-31

I was driving at 50 MPH and the vehicle started shaking violently and I had to slow down and pull over before the shaking would stop. Another time I was driving at 50 MPH again and hit a small bump and the violent shaking again occurred. Again I had to slow down considerably before it stopped shaking. This is known as death wobble and chrysler knows it. They need to be held accountable for using cheap parts on jeeps. *tr

125,000 miles NHTSA complaint 963478 filed 2013-02-16

Also reported on the 1999 Jeep Cherokee

Premature brake pad or rotor wear

46 reports median 77k

Other powertrain problem

36 reports median 75k

Other brake problem

35 reports median 77k

Other body or interior problem

34 reports median 138k

Other engine problem

29 reports median 72k

Other visibility problem

26 reports median 76k

How far this goes

This page is kept out of search results because 15 reports is not enough to publish percentiles from. It stays reachable because somebody looking at this exact car would rather see the reports than be told there are none.

Complaints are voluntary, so 15 is a floor and not a count of affected cars. Mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers. And the mode itself is assigned by software reading the complaint text, which is reliable in bulk and fallible one report at a time.

Questions this page answers

At what mileage does other suspension problem happen on the 1999 Jeep Cherokee?

Across 4 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 115,000 miles. A quarter were filed before — and a quarter after —. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.

How common is other suspension problem on the 1999 Jeep Cherokee?

15 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.1 per 1,000 vehicles. Complaints are voluntary, so this is a floor rather than a count of affected cars.

What this is and is not. These are the mileages at which owners chose to complain to a federal agency, which is not the same as the mileage at which the part fails on every car. It skews toward failures that happened outside warranty, cost real money, or frightened someone. It is still the only public dataset that carries failure mileage at all, and the shape of a few hundred readings is informative even when a single one is not. Methodology · JSON · this failure on other cars

Source Owner complaints and recall records published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, model years 1996–2027 Figures rebuilt Published by AtWhatMileage How every figure is computed