300M clunking is fixed

I haven't picked up my car yet but the Dodge dealer who accepted the challenge called me up and was all excited and declared the car fixed. Apparently, with the very warm weather today (70 degrees here in NC) the car did it consistently. 3 technicians (one in the car turning the wheel) worked it until they found a torn inner tie rod bushing. It was also not properly torqued. He says case is closed.

My question is that in replacing the 2 front struts would the Chrysler dealer have touched that bushing? How about when changing the steering rack? How about when changing the bottom half of the steering column?

I am asking those as separate questions to determine at what point, if at all, the Chyrsler dealer messed up.

Thanks for everyone's help on my clunk. By the way, there were surely multiple clunks involved.

Reply to
Art
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Art,

So glad it *finally* worked out for you. Any way to get something back from the first dealer as in terms of free maintenance or are you done with that dealership?

Ken

Reply to
NJ Vike

I did a google search and came up with this interesting complaint regarding previous generation LH vehicles:

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Reply to
Art

Anyone read this page? It is hilarious.

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Might make a chrysler owner afraid to drive.

Reply to
Art

I am shipping the car to my in-laws in Florida. We will be without a Chrysler product for the first time in 13 years. I am interested in finding out whether the first dealer messed up but all of this mess began with a pothole and some expensive repairs were done under warranty when it could have been denied. So my in-laws get a car with a new steering rack, new struts, new strut bearing plates, new bottom half of steering column and a few odds and ends. I spent $900 at the Chrysler dealer and I don't know what at the Dodge dealer. I'll post the amount when I find out. But the rack would have been $1400 installed I believe and some have failed way under the 100k mile mark so it could be worse. They will certainly drive the car more than 100k so hopefully they will escape the cost of the rack because of the clunk solution process.

Reply to
Art

Perhaps Chrysler would be interested in your adventures?

Ken

Reply to
NJ Vike

Sounds bogus me. I've never had problems as described by this site. I have had three Chrysler products since 1991 to present.

Hmmmm

Reply to
NJ Vike

I guess I should also state that just because it didn't happen to me doesn't make it impossible.

Reply to
NJ Vike

Actually most of the issues there are well known but dramatized and comparable issues probably exist for other makes. I remember when Honda first went to timing belts. When they started to fail prematurely they sent letters telling owners that the maintenence interval had been decreased and you better get your belt changed soon at your cost.

Reply to
Art

They could have, but shouldn't have. IOW - it's much easier to disconnect at the outer tie rod than the inner tie rod, and the outers have to be disconnected at some point in the process to remove the old struts (i.e., each outer tie rod attaches directly to an arm that is part of the its respective strut). A competent mechanic would not have touched the inners for that job - it would have been time wasted.

Absolutely. The inner tie rod bushings are what attach the tie rods (two - left and right) directly to the rack. Each inner tie rod (there are two - left and right) has a hole in it. The hole has the annular ring bushing in it. A bolt goes thru that bushing and threads directly into the (side-to-side) moving element of the rack.

I'm not sure about that one - but if the rack did not have to be removed for that process, I'm thinking 'no' to that one.

With as common and known a wearout problem as the inner tie rod bushings on an LH car are, someone had to be pretty freaking dishonest or incompetent (or both) to have missed that until $1000 later in the troubleshooting process. I'd be pi$$ed, but sometimes you have to cut your losses and move on. Once again, I'm dreading the day when I can no longer work on my own cars for exactly this kind of crap!

Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the letter 'x')

Reply to
Bill Putney

One other detail on this, Art: When an alignment is done, if the technician locks the adjuster sleeve down with the tie rods leaning over fore or aft, the tie rod gets into a binding situation when the wheels are turned (as in turning left or right) - the result is an awful twisting stress on the tie rods that will wear the inner bushings out in no time flat. A good alignment technician knows that he has to manually rotate the tie rods to be pointing fairly close to straight up as he tightens the adjuster sleeve (some sideways leaning is OK, but not a lot). I'm not saying this is what caused your problem. Most likely some of the previous repair work that was done is to blame, or at least it should have been discoverd before now. The fact that one of the inner tie rod bolts was (apparently loose - reading between the lines of what you were told) is some indication that that is the likely explanation. On the other hand, the new dealer said the bushing was "torn" - that would point more to acute extreme physical stress as in the not-straight-up-pointing tie rod after an alignment (or re-assembly). Hard to say for sure. Like I said - sometimes you just cut your losses and walk away - not worth fighting with them over unless you find a real smoking gun.

Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the letter 'x')

Reply to
Bill Putney

I pretty much knew the answer regarding the steering rack/inner tie rods. I don't understand how the original Chrysler dealer could reassemble the front end after replacing the rack and screw it up then. The same dealership then would have done an alignment to finish the job. I figure that is where they screwed up. I will talk to the Chrysler dealer about this but will not get into a frenzy. I am thinking they should at least cover the Dodge dealer repair cost. Though I doubt they will.

Reply to
Art

Also, it should be a matter of course on the LH's to replace the inner tie rod bushings when replacing the rack ($20 for the bushings, 98% of the labor is already there for the rack job). But then again, even if they replaced them, if they got screwed up because of the subsequent alignment (the tie rod lean-over thing)...

Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the letter 'x')

Reply to
Bill Putney

Reply to
philthy

Reply to
philthy

True. Timing belts and inteference engine design both in the same low-end consumer vehicle: Engineering malpractice at its best.

Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the letter 'x')

Reply to
Bill Putney

So, now this means you WON'T be giving your In-Laws a Clunker? :)

Reply to
Hachiroku

Looks like the Dodge dealer fixed it. No sign of clunk. Too bad they didn't get steeing wheel back exactly straight. I'll leave that to my father in law. I will talk to the Chrysler dealer Monday and see what they say about their errors.

Reply to
Art

I almost forgot. They charged $200 which I thought was a bargain considering.

Reply to
Art

Is this a particular problem with with LH cars or is it a issue on other makes and models?

Reply to
Art

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