How can it be bad design? Any vehicle with a-arms for suspension has the same design, so why are there not more cars/trucks out of the millions on the road with cracked a-arms? My S-10 was hit by another car right in the drivers side wheel. My upper and lower a-arms both bent, but neither ball joint broke and the a-arms didn't break. These were still the factory ones though, but they had about 160,000 miles on them at the time, greasing them every 3000 miles helps. You keep saying get your S-10 checked out, exactly how do you want people to do that? Do we find a jet engine mechanic with million dollar tools that can detect metal fatigue? Thats about the only thing that could detect metal that is about to break but has no outward signs of cracks. Now if you get under to grease the joints every 3000 miles and inspect the joints you stand a good chance of noticeing small cracks before they turn into big ones. But telling everyone to take their S-10 to the local parts swapper won't help anything.
A YEAR? Why do you think the manual calls for a "Lube Oil and Filter" every 3,000 miles? LUBE includes lubing the ball joints, all steering linkages and any other grease fittings on the truck, in 3 month/3,000 mile intervals. This is regardless of driving conditions, unless you don't qualify for severe duty, but the intervals NEVER go above 6 months, and that's REALLY pushing it...
I'll agree with others >As far as I know a grease job
I would respectfully disagree with this. If a ball joint or front suspension part that can be greased was greased properly 'once'....I see no reason why it could not easily go 1 year without being regreased. I see as many, or more problems with 'overgreasing' components and wrecking the seals on said components. Or components that are 'never' greased at all. There are plenty of 'sealed' front end components that go years without additional grease. But in reality, they are no more 'sealed' then the component that happens to have a grease nipple attached to it.
I won't grease components that have seals all swelled up by an excessive amount of grease. So often, on the oil change, not every component gets grease.
And I'd be willing to bet a very large pctge of vehicles never get their ball joints greased, whether the cause be neglect or service fraud, and lets not forget the "lubed-for-life" or "sealed" ball joints which simply have the zerk fittings replaced with plugs.
As long as the ball joints haven't been submerged, lubing once a year is nowhere near neglect.
Well rosie, I for one will heed your warning I have my truck serviced every
3000-4000 miles but who knows with out checking what gets greased.And with
145,000 miles maybe a little checking is in order. Thanks for trying to save me some grief..Pat
Wow...I can't belive I came across this. In 1996 or 97 my 89' s10 did the same thing. and I was going about 35. this happend just after I had NEW joints installed upper and lower. I hit a pot hole, big one doing about 50. about 10 miles later bag hit the ground. I blame the pot hole for it but sounds like same place it broke off at. The guy that put them on said it was the pot hole too. hell who knows, just wanted to let yoiu know it has happend before. sounds to me you could save some lives here ms rosie if this is a problem with these trucks. mine was not in the best of shape and I got rid of it after this. Could be why mine broke also i guess. maybe older s10's should be checked some how? like the other guy said it would be hard to tell if it was bad unless you could see a crack in the metal frame. and about it not being lubed it does look dry. When you take a veical in for service you neve really do know what they do or don't do fix or don't fix if your not a mechanic yourself. but any way good luck with it.
. (for a full understanding....read the entire thread) On Sat, Sep 13, 2003, 9:27am (CDT+1) snipped-for-privacy@fuse.net (Rosie=A0Baker) evidently crossposted this..........
If you own a Chevy S-10 you should see this page!
formatting link
Your life may depend on it! ..
Rosie, read my reply at alt.autos.chev-trucks
Perhaps you should not be so blatantly liable in your accusations on such a public level..... without first researching indepth what you're web site is suggesting. Regardless of what you are, or are not, trying to accomplish with it....... it comes across very distinctly as an accusation toward a powerfull corporation.
Installer error, or substandard diagnosing abilitlies by the alignment shop........plain and simple.
best of luck with the law suit you're not building Scribb Abel
The smartest man I ever met............. Never said a word.
Yes I may have jumped the gun so to speak on the cause of this. And I feel you are right after hearing others opinions about it. I will change the web page so it doesn't sound like I'm coming down on Chevy so much. BUT! you must admit there is not much steel at that point on the control arm where this broke off at. UNKNOWING ball joint neglect does seem to be the cause (or more likely the cause anyway) But I hope I can get S-10 owners to understand the danger here is VERY real. I had no idea such a thing could happen. "did you?" maybe you did? But just think about how many S-10s are out there in the same shape as this one was. And others say the same design is on other vehicles also. Of all the people that have posted here. Yours hit home the most. Thank You. I'll start work on the web page as I close this thread.
Perhaps you should not be so blatantly liable in your accusations on such a public level..... without first researching indepth what you're web site is suggesting. Regardless of what you are, or are not, trying to accomplish with it....... it comes across very distinctly as an accusation toward a powerfull corporation.
Installer error, or substandard diagnosing abilitlies by the alignment shop........plain and simple.
best of luck with the law suit you're not building Scribb Abel
The smartest man I ever met............. Never said a word.
Ok, so you are saying then that if a person takes their rig to Chevrolet and they fail to grease every grease zerk, they should be sued for neglect. Or is it, if you get home and don't check to make sure that they greased all, its your fault? I've been told twice on two diffferent rigs that I needed new idler arms. Why? Well, I decided to risk the drive home to see if I could tell why, and why is, as you probably already know, they were never greased. They are hard to get to, and who cares anyway? Fact is stranger than fiction isn't it?
I know Idler arms are hard to get to. Mine get greased every LOF, I watch the person doing the job. One of the benefits of finding a small service station that still has reasonable rates, I'm paying LESS than I was at Jiffy Lube and I'm getting Mobil 1 instead of Pennzoil synthetic and I get to watch the person doing the work, not just see a couple arms coming up from a pit with a little hose in hand.
You'd play hell trying to watch someone do the job, even within 10 feet where I come from. I've done it, but they don't like it, they are designed to prevent it, and they run when they see me coming. Point is, they get paid to do a job, and when I get paid to do a job, I do it. I don't sherk it because I care about what I do, not just what i talk about.
One of the benefits of finding a
I don't really think that accounts for much. Jiffy lube here almost started my truck without oil in it, and no one, including me wants anyone breathing down their neck when they work. Tell me where there is a service station that still does this stuff, and if the guy can read, I'll go there too.
and I'm getting Mobil 1 instead of Pennzoil
I understand, but if I could watch that closely, I'd do it myself. I have all the maintenence manuals for my truck. All four, original GM manuals, more accurate than others but not perfect. But I am at least as educated as some who wing it, that i have trusted my truck to. I've learned my lesson, GM hasn't.
I'm not astute enough to know, but I've had three S-10's and two of them were good trucks. The second was a 91 4 banger 5 speed 2wd that has 148K and will still run circles around the other one I have now, an 88 4wd
2.8V6 auto, and it got 30+mpg with a good tail wind. Yes, I realize the 88's heavier, but its also TBI and gets terrible mileage, 14mpg. The first was an 84 2.8V6 that went 150K before I got rid of it. All I ever had to do to either of them was put in a waterpump, batteries, and regularly change oil, and tires. I never knew or cared about such things as ball joints, but they never went out on me. This
88 has been messed with by so many incompetents that it was ruined. It cost me $6K after the fact, working 65 hours a week to pay for it before I realized that. Point still is, no one cares, except me. The idler arms I had replaced were on a 2000 Blazer and this 88. I know for a fact that the 2000 was dealer neglect. They paid for it after I argued for 4 hours. I don't go back.
Only steering part on my truck that's been
Thats why there aren't any more where i live, and that is the way it should be. Too bad if it puts some dumb ass college hi school kid out of work, he can't f*ck up any ones vehicle then. I switched to mobile one in my 88 and it was a hidden blessing. it led to a complete overhaul. now all i have to do is replace the wiring loom under the hood, because that dumb ass left wires laying on the exhaust manifold, the fix cvboots, [ill have the ball joints, and tie rod ends, checked, I hope], oil pan skid plates, wheel bearings, torsion bar tweaking to get the thing lowered back down near stock, cat converter, and I'll still have a dog, but it don't have no cancered out body and you won't see another like it within 500 miles. And thats all we really care about anyway isn't it? With deflation coming, I take some comfort that I'm not in debt and have all reciepts.
The guy doesn't mind me coming into the garage, I stood outside while he did the LOF up to the point he poured the oil in, then I went in because he asked me a question, but I watched from outside the whole time. He tested the charging system and I was right there, to see what came of it, standing next to the truck, even helping him. This is a "Service station" like some haven't seen in a while, it's actually one of 2 such places in the same vicinity, they do most types of repairs, save body work, as well as being a gas station. Place used to rent the service bays out, with lifts inside, to car owners to do their own work, from what I hear.
Only thing the place I go doesn't do is fill the washer fluid and give you a free car wash. He even lubes the hood latch and driver's side door hinges. They usually check the tire pressure and adjust, but he had 3 or 4 people stacking up behind me this last time.
I'd do it myself also, I'm just not THAT motivated to do the work on my truck. I'll replace parts, but I'd have to almost literally dig the ramps out of the back of the garage to get under and drain the oil.
It's why I don't go there, and why I started going there, the Valvoline place failed to lube the zerks on several occations, so I went to JL, they stopped doing a decent job after about a year, along with the lower price on the service to get M-1 in the crankcase. I can spend the $1-$2 on a jug of washer fluid when I need it, and I haven't needed to top off my coolant in the last year. I'm under the hood on a fairly regular basis, checking the oil, tranny fluid, etc, etc, so I can keep an eye on the coolant. Heck, I personally change the fuel filter, JL once suggested I change it "because it looks a little rusty". I said thanks, I'll take care of that myself later this week. They suggested a fuel system cleaner because I had a little carbon build-up on the throttle blade. Dunno if you've ever seen the first-gen of W-code 4.3s, but there's NO FI parts NEAR the throttle blade...
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