A friend of mine has a 1997 F150 and it's front balljoints are making nasty noises. Unfortunately Ford, in it's infinite wisdom, has seen fit to equip this truck with non-lubricable balljoints. Duh! It's going to cost $800 to replace them at the dealer with again, non lubricable ones.
Are there any 3rd party balljoints out there that can be lubricated if need be? And last a bit longer than 50K miles.
Thanks!
Buy some moog ball joints for the truck and rent a ball joint press. It is not a hard job if it is 2 heel drive, if it is 4 wheel drive you have to disassemble the hubs, again not a problem. I worked for a dealer for
15 years and made alot of money replacing fords better idea. If it 2 wheel drive and you have some mechanical knowledge you can do the job in a couple of hours.btw, some parts stores let you use the ball joint press for free if you leave a deposit and buy yor parts from them. check autozone, advance, pep boys etc.
hope this helps, Greg
at 02 Apr 2004, BOSS429 [ snipped-for-privacy@webtv.net] wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@storefull-3311.bay.webtv.net:
It sure does, I'm forwarding it to my friend...
You will find that the replacement joints (upper) from MOOG et al are control arm assemblies.... I can't comment on whether the replacements are greasable or not. The only suggestion I can offer is that your friend shops carefully.... many suppliers offer two lines - premium and cheap so he needs to be sure that he's not buying the cheapie at premium price.
As BOS429 pointed out, the lowers are replaceable and the C-clamp style press makes them so much easier to do. As far as the trucks are concerned.... turn 'em upside down - they're all sisters.
at 02 Apr 2004, Jim Warman [ snipped-for-privacy@tenalpsulet.net] wrote in news:Wcpbc.1771$J56.1728@edtnps89:
Thanks for that tip Jim, i'm definately forwarding it...
I'm just surprised Ford didn't make these things greasable. Especially in the fla climate down here. I'm sure the working are still fine inside and would basically only require greasing for the noise to stop. But Ford would rather soak it's customer for about 800 to replace them. of course with another non-greasable set.
I ran into the same problem with my '97 Explorer last year. At 51k on the clock ended up replacing both lowers and uppers for a cost aproaching $1000. Of course with Ford's better ideas, you have to replace the whole upper control arm. The replacements I got are still not greasable on the uppers, but are at least greasable on the lowers.
Jason S.
FWIW I've seen many self inflicted ball joint woes.... too many will pump until they pop the seal letting any sort of contaminant into the joint. In nearly 40 years, I haven't seen ball joint wear change much..... some manufacturing "errors" will have a design that expires early but these are usually corrected in short order.
That manufacturers put a limit on the warranty period should be a clue as to when we can expect trouble...... I will add my less than complimentary opinion to Fords revised wear limit regarding ball joints....... 0.060" is too much play for me to accurately align the front suspension.
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