wormhole

For the past couple of days my 4runner has had a weird feel while driving and felt like there was tension on the steering wheel (wanted to pull right). I had looked underneath at everything and nothing seemed to be out of line.

Well, this morning I ran to store to pick something up before work and rememberd that I had forgot my check book at home and decided to run home and get it. At one spot in the road near an intersection there is a storm drainage ditch/dip in the road. I slowed down to about 10-15 mph, and fast than that and you'll scrap/bottom out. Right after I pass this the drivers side front end dives and I hear this scrapping/grindding sound. I drive a little more to get my self out of the intersection and get out to see what happens.

When I get out and look I just bust out laughing (I just couldn't help myself in this stituation and the person walking out to their car probable thought I had lost my mind) as the driver's side front wheel is not partially under my 4runner. Luckily, the slider prevented it from going any further under. So I made a few calls and after an hour and half the tow truck finally comes and gets me.

While waiting for the truck a few stop and ask if I'm okay and a few I just shot the breeze with for a little bit. Heck, someone even took a photo themselves.

So now my 4runner is at the Toyota dealership (they replaced the lower control arms a few months back) and I'm in a rental Chevy Avero. I'm also talking with my insurance too see if they will cover anything. I doubt it but I'm hopefully.

Thankfully, this took place on a side road and not on the highway or out on the trail somewhere.

So anyways here are the photo's:

What's that white line on the road and why is the vehicle slanting to one side


Well, that can't be good


Well, there's your problem




Anyone care to guess what the estimated repair bill is??

justin_4runner

1,500 to 2,000 depending on if they need to replace any brake stuff. cv axle can be put back together. and they will want to replace the upper ball joint to.... but just my guess.

wifes4now

wow, good thing you werent going 50mph

wifes4now

i would see about the toyota dealer paying for all of it since they just changed that control arm

vital22re

iTrader: (2)

Yeah um. If they replaced the arms. Then they should have seen the warn ball joints.

J2F42C

Dealership: about $1500 to $2500 depending on how far they want to bend you over that day.
You, the shadetree mechanic: $300 for OEM lower and upper BJ, new CV boots, OEM brake line,OEM inner and outer tie rod, poly sway bar bushings, and a couple of tools for the job.. And a new alignment.

But the lower looks pretty new. Was it replaced at the same time as the LCA? Where are the bump stops for the LCA? Did they forget to put the old ones on? I don't know if that could lead to premature failure but others may chime in with more knowledge...

mt_goat

I think it could, the ball joints could have been taken beyond their limits of motion. Can be hard on the shocks and CVs too.

Here's an upper BJ that IMHO was damaged due to over extension beyond the designed range of motion (from my 93 truck). This happened during testing of a redesign of the suspension I had made. Needless to say the test was a big failure. The bottom pic shows the suspension became locked in the full compression end of travel (its a long story but all is good now).

SRT4runner

How many miles were you at when it failed? I've seen a few threads about this happening and I'm wondering if I should get mine replaced as a preventative thing. I'm at 112k miles currently.

wormhole

145k is on the od

madbomber08

Do you think the lift maybe weakened the balljoints? I'm just wondering because i have 175,000 on my stock 4 runner and wonder if i should be worried. My 4runner does pull to the left a wee bit but i just figured it was because of an alignment issue.....

warpigg

my lower ball joint failled on the trail and i had to walk back home 6 or 7 miles. dont ever buy $15 ball joints, try and buy the ones that have grease fittings or OEM. when i did mine i hade to get a whole new axle shaft because the one the previous owner had on there was the wrong diameter for the OEM c.v. boots. but it onley cost me $50 for the axle and i think $20 for the c.v.'s.

J2F42C

Mt. Goat,

Exactly, it looks as if the upper BJ possibly broke off clean due to stress from the LCA operating past its normal standard deviation for the range of travel. I never thought the bump stops were that important. The lower BJ looks intact. Could the lift have exacerbated the quickness of the failure? Possibly. Thanks for the pics.

To the OP: after they replaced the left LCA, did you look over their work? Did you notice that the bump stops were missing before this happened or did you remove them yourself?

JamesD

Something tells me that they forgot to tighten the lower ball joint nut and it came loose. Do you have any more pics? Check and see if the nut is still on the lower ball joint. It should still be there even if the ball joint seperated.

James

sebastianholmes

might as well SAS it now!

wormhole

Went back though all my auto repair receipts and found one from May 29, 2010 in which the left lower ball joint was replaced - with one from Checkers/O'Reilly auto parts (Moog). So I wonder now if it was a piece of crap ball joint (got to see if I can find any other info on it) or if it was due to some other act that would've caused it to fail. If it was truely the part that failed.



Are those parts covered under warranty at all?

J2F42C

I was thinking that your upper BJ may have been the one that failed due to no bump stops on the LCA, allowing the LCA to travel more than normal. That still may have contributed to the situation, but given that fellow members who have replaced LBJs with anything other than OEM and reporting most, if not all of them to be junk, I'd say the Moog failed ya. You probably could get a new LBJ, but I'd get an OEM one when replacing my parts.

I've used Moog parts on American trucks and have had good sucess with them, but not on Toyota.

Got any close shots of the LBJ?

Go OEM for BJ replacement, use no other.....

mt_goat

Wormhole, this is an important point.

wormhole

I never noticed that and from the look of the photo it looks like they never reinstalled them with the new lca. I don't see any wear marks on the lca.

J2F42C

If they were never reinstalled, or if you never had new ones installed, then the shop who installed your left LCA could be liable for the damages if their negligence exacerbated and/or directly caused your BJ failure. But proving it could be more than it is worth just to fix the 4 runner in the short and long run, especially if it is your DD.

Since I have only shadetree suspension experience, I'll leave it up to Mt. Goat and other to give ya more viable input....

02_Limited

What's were your first indications of lbj failure?