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DSW
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
12/08/2003
05:48:16
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 Subject: Do Ball Joints Need Grease?
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I just replaced my upper and lower ball joints today and cut the seals off the old stock sealed units to see what the problem was. The joints that were still intact had very little grease in them! I was expecting to see the joint and seal flooded with grease. The joint had a little on it and the seal was about 10% full. Heck, the seal even had dry spots on it where the grease never touched.
Dodge missed the boat on this one. If they are too cheap to put zerks on the ball joints, well at least pack them up with grease.
If your sealed ball joints are not bad, I would suggest getting a needle fitting for your grease gun and pumping the ball joints full of grease. Yeah, it makes a little hole in the seal but I would rather have a full ball joint with a microscopic hole in the seal than a totally sealed ball joint without proper lubrication.
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bman42
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
12/08/2003
08:00:04
|  RE: Do Ball Joints Need Grease?
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absolutely, ball joints need grease.
by being "non-greasable" dodge/chrysler is helping sells in the parts dept.
feel the love.
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RadioMan
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
12/08/2003
08:49:20
|  RE: Do Ball Joints Need Grease?
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Yea, Chrysler went to the non-greasable joints but
so did Ford and GM from what I've heard. It's not
just trucks either. My 01 Dodge Mini Van doesn't
have any zerks either! No, it doesn't have zerk
plugs either.
I'll bet money that no ball joint is covered
under the 7/70 plan either. Chrysler's junk rotors
are only covered for 10,000 miles, not 3/36!
Chrysler says it's not covered over 10 grand
because it's "normal ware and tare". What a bunch
of BULL!
It's almost (or it's here now) to the point that
you're better off to stick money into older units
and keeping them. New ones are not built with any
quality any more!
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92Dakota4x4
GenII
12/08/2003
12:35:35
| RE: Do Ball Joints Need Grease?
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Mercedes also has non-greasable ball joints on the newer cars.We replace them a lot because of noise.
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DSW
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
12/09/2003
22:46:21
| RE: Do Ball Joints Need Grease?
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Yeah RadioMan, I think they are letting the quality slip for looks and gadgets. If they would engineer the sealed parts to last 150K without grease zerks it wouldn't be half bad.
I drove a Civic over 300K for work and it had the stock sealed ball joints on it. They were still good when the car was totaled a couple of years ago. The car was butt ugly, but I never had to work on it except for normal maintenance.
It just doesn't make sense to leave a 10 cent part off a $50 assembly. Looks like Dodge (and Ford and GM and Mercedes, etc. etc.) are making things cheaper at our expense. I guess if it lasts past the warranty period they are happy.
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Jeff
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
12/10/2003
17:59:17
| RE: Do Ball Joints Need Grease?
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my upper control arm bushings dried up and they were covered under my extended warranty
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THE TRUTH
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
12/11/2003
17:05:18
| RE: Do Ball Joints Need Grease?
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where do you come up with this crap??? not covered after 10,000 miles because of "wear and tear" (note correct spelling) 3 year 36,000 mile drive train warrenty means just that, for 3 years or 36,000 miles whatever comes first ANYTHING from the radiator to the rear axle bearings that actually is used to make the vehicle move, is covered. For free. PERIOD. It does not include brakes as brakes stop the vehicle, not drive it, and in use, wear out. I don't see how anyone could ever say that ball joints are used to propel it down the road either.
If you replace the soft rotors that you have in the newer ones with the old style hard cast ones of the '70's all of you would be complaining that the rotors squeel every time you put on the brakes. Blame the environmentalists for your brake problems, not your car/truck manufacturer.
see what is really going on is that about 10 years ago some Washington enviromentalist decided that because asbestos is bad for factory and construction workers and kids and just about everyone, including mechanics, that brake pads and drums with asbestos in them, which is what made them not sqeel and made the hard diskes and drums last a long time, was bad for mechanics and should be outlawed from brake pads and drums, so Washington passed such a law and made it so.
Now came the hard part for car manufactures, how to make a brake system that does not squeel whith harder pads, as that was the only thing they could use as the softer materiel that would work was outlawed. The end result was a SOFTER disk/drum. The softer disk/drum that had to be used as a hard disk and a hard pad would cause your truck to not stop very fast became the only way saftly bring you down from high speeds in a big hurry.
THAT is why the disks and drums go bad.
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MikeS
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
12/11/2003
18:34:39
| RE: Do Ball Joints Need Grease?
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I need to replace my right side ball joints. what is the cost of the parts involved and how labor intensive is the job? Thanks guys
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DSW
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
12/11/2003
22:53:32
| RE: Do Ball Joints Need Grease?
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Took me 4-5 hours last weekend to drill out all the rivets and replace the upper and lower ball joints on both sides. Complete day to do ball joints, brakes, oil, etc. etc. I posted a quick rundown on the procedure a couple of days ago on another thread, look on the board for the last 4-5 days and you can find the post.
Moog Problem Solver ball joints with the zerks were $43 upper and $40 lower from http://www.autopartsgiant.com and they have free shipping on orders over $50. You need to look up a 98 or 99 Dakota with the 5.2 or 5.9 to get the parts because for some odd reason they don't list them for the 2000 and up Daks, but they are the same parts.
If your going to do one of the uppers do the other one at the same time, or else you will be getting greasy in a couple of months doing the one you didn't replace, and paying for another alignment to boot. I replaced all of them because I have 111K on the truck and didn't want a surprise doing 75 down the freeway, they were all loose, but, I have 111K on the truck.
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Rob454
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
12/12/2003
12:20:32
| RE: Do Ball Joints Need Grease?
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just because you have a 3/36 warranty doesnt mean everythign is covered. the one thing thats not covered is WEAR items. brake pads rotors drums and shoes accessory belts, tires and things like that are not covered over 12000 miles. Im not sure if you were talking about brake pads or ball joints. ball joints are covered if thats what you were talking about then youre right.
as for Asbestos it wasnt jsut the enviros that took a stand. that stuff was is and will be killing people. asbestos wasnt just in the brake pads, its in buildings, pipe wrapping construction materials ETC. Im a contractor and trust me the last thing I need to come across is asbestos in a house Im working on. My brakes seem to need to be replaced every 25 000 miles realistically
Rob
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greendakotasp
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
12/13/2003
02:43:46
| RE: Do Ball Joints Need Grease?
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I replaced my balljoints with moog greasable balljoints and I have a question. Since there is no way to seal them, how much grease do i add? just till the plastic cover is firm? and is the cover allowed to be moved around freely because there is nothing that hold its on besides being connected to the spindle.....
I also have an occasional clunk (sounds like a minor version of the huge clunks i had before the ball joint replacement) is this normal? I have a feeling it is in the springs/control arms since i lowered it.
Thanks
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MikeS
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
12/13/2003
11:29:35
| RE: Do Ball Joints Need Grease?
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dealer wants 40.99 for the upper and 109 for the lower. autopartsgiant.com is charging 42.94 for the upper and 52.28 for the lower. I guess I'll be ordering online. Too bad the price went up though.
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firereddak
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
12/13/2003
12:35:02
| RE: Do Ball Joints Need Grease?
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when I had the upper passenger side ball joint replaced on my 2000 ex cab dak I purchased a replacement joint from autozone it wasnt a moog and it didnt have a grease fitting either.
It cost $32 and I had the shop that does all my alignment work install it.
I always talk to the manager while he works on my truck and he used an air chisel to get the rivets off, this only took about a couple of minutes, and the complete job with alignment about 30 mins. total, labor was $45
So if you have an air supply and chisel that would be the best way to go.
Ive sold my 2000 and bought a 2003 quad and now after finding this site and watching the alignment shop replace my other one if these go bad out of warnanty ill do it myself with the moogs.
also the dodge dealers in my area said I had to buy the complete control arm that they didnt sell just the ball joint and that was $230 just for one arm, what a crock.
sorry about the long post.
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DSW
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
12/14/2003
22:13:43
| RE: Do Ball Joints Need Grease?
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Damn, If I knew an air chisel would pop the heads off the rivets I would have went down and bought one. Probably would have saved 1-2 hours on the job.
firereddak, you got a good deal on the labor and alignment. I called Dodge service here in Vegas and they wanted $100 for an alignment, sorry if I quote you here, but what a crock. Paid $55 at a good shop for the aligment. Sorry if I date myself, but I remember when an alignment would run $19.99. Guess those days or long gone.
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Andrew Goetz
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
12/15/2003
15:13:38
|  Do both the upper and lower balljoints together?
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I have a 99 dakota 3.9 and i know that my ball joints are bad. I am guessing that both the upper and lower are bad...is that a good assumption? And what are some price quotes to expect from a mechanics shop to have them put on? Any info would help.
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