I took the rig in to a new place for an alignment, it was pulling and doing the normal out of whack dance.

The new place, which comes well regarded, but with whom I have not done business before, just called and said new upper and lower ball joints are needed plus an inner tie rod before the alignment will be worth a darn.

The truck has a little more than 153k miles, most of the last 35k has been abusive wheeling on stock ball joints and steering components.

How much are ball joints? Do you think I am being jerked around?

Thanks,
Adrian

 

no probably not, ball joints are exspensive. i know on my truck it called for 2.5-2.9 hrs ea balljoint. think of that times 50-80 an hour labor. plus marked up parts. wowee thats pricey. mine were just gettin sloppy at 144,000 i replaced them all myself in around 6 hrs and a new idler, cost me i think around 30 a ball joint and 45 for the idler, all lifetime moogs

 

Adrian,

Considering you have the stock ball joints, lift, and do a fair amount of 4 wheeling-the stock ball joints will go bad as they're not built to handle much lift (excessive angles). Look for aftermarket (chaos) components with a uniball design. Do a search and you'll get more info. I have a 4th gen and am adding 3" of lift and plan on replacing the upper control arms in the next year or so as they're going to wear out.

Nice rig...

 

Thanks for the quick response.

I can I should do them myself, I am just short on places to do it since the apartment folks got pissed last time I changed the idler.

It makes sense, just have to see if they will take goats and shiny beads.

 

I just replaced the inner ball joint on the steering rack of my Tacoma and I am at 65,000. I'm not sure if it was the lift, front locker or all the wheelin that has caused this, maybe a combo of all. All the others seem fine, for now. Now I think the bushing on the steering rack needs to be replaced.

Not sure if any of this helps.

 

Adrian-

Are you getting the infamous clicking/popping when flexing? I had a place tell me (when I brought my 4runner in for an alignment) that I needed a couple of ball joints replaced- turned out they couldn't adjust them properly because they were frozen. A couple days of soaking with PB blaster and a new alignment shop and they were good to go. I'd ask them specifically what the issue was, whether the joints were bad, torn boots, etc? You can always do the standard test, jack up one front tire at a time, place a long prybar under the tire and flex it, see if you here any clicking, etc.

 

You put PB Blaster in you ball joints?

 

That's the thing, my truck makes a lot of noises and is less than refined.

The front end is loose, that is just how I have always dealt with it.

In fairness, the last alignment was more than 50k miles ago and things are probably near the end. Little ticked to drop cash on stuff that should be off the truck soon, but it needs to go down the road and this will get it done.

 

I did the entire front end a few months back in a few hours, inner and outer tie rod ends, upper and lower ball joins, installed bj spacers, idler arm and pitman arm! I bought everything from AutoZone all Dana parts, all lifetime warranty through AutoZone for under $400 except the BJ spacers. I did have to beat the life out of my ball joints to get them to pop but I got them! It rides and steers like new!

 

Edited: Yup, It's t-bar style. Oops!

 

Ben- not "in" but on the threads on the tie-rods- my bad, I confused the TRE's with ball joints.

 

Adrian,

You can check the BJ's to see if they are good by popping them out and manually moving them around, if they are somewhat hard to move (stiff) but move fluidly then they are good. If they flop around and have slop they are bad. You can also pull back the boot to see if they are clean and if the cups haven't been damaged. If they look good, some new grease and boots should be all you need. If you know they are bad then just use a pickle fork and pound 'em out but if you are unsure try other methods such as a BJ puller or a gear puller. Some have luck with just smacking the side of the press fit area with a BFH and having the BJ's pop out. I haven't been so lucky! Whatever you do, do not hammer on the top of the threaded part, it will deform easily partly due to the holes for the cotter pin, if you must tap it a little screw the castle nut on backwards until it's almost flush with the top of the threads.

For the record, uni-balls although ultimately stronger than factory BJ's actually have less angularity and are more susceptible to damage from the elements. Race quality BJ's cost more than high-quality uni-balls, are stronger and have way more angularity. So BJ's in and of themselves are not bad at all. My biggest gripe with them is they are a PITA to remove w/o damaging compared to a uni-ball which is not a tapered press fit. BJ's make for slow on the trail fixes for things like busted CV's etc.

Total Chaos makes an awesome double-shear heim steering link kit for 1st gen IFS systems ('86-'95) that when combined with their idler arm kit makes for a very tight feeling front end and steering. The price is higher than what most of us usually spend but the products are super nice and ridiculously burly (read: worth it because you will never need to replace them).

They also just released a LBJ uni-ball replacement for their LT kits that should work for stock width trucks as well. It just bolts in the place of the factory LBJ.

Bottom line: Verify for yourself before paying the alignment shop. If they need to be replaced, do it yourself since it's pretty easy and save massive $$$.

 

They are sloppy for sure, loose like a cheerleader on the internet, I have had both spindles apart in the last 6 months for spacer and CV replacements. Guess I never knew any better.

Just bummed on the unexpected.

It is in getting taken care of as we speak, should drive again at the end of the day.

 

I wouldn't know anything about that

 

Time to cut that crap off and stop dumping money into it. Now if you had the coil spring IFS that would be a different story.

The sooner the better with that t-bar stuff, the power you have was twisting it something serious in Moab.

I think your on the right track with the FJ-60/62 front axle. A nice big ol, Ford 9" out back would handle the power nicely as well. Two 9" diffs.

 

I know Steve. We will finish Brent's truck and Hunt's truck and then it is my turn.

I am going to have some low mileage nice ball joints for sale one of these days I guess.