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WipLash
R/T
2/24/2004
14:01:41
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 Subject: RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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eddy,
I kept my 92 to 48K, my 93 to 38K (totaled out), 94 to 61K (extended warranty), 2000R/T to 17k (still have, ext warranty also), 2001 to 36K, 2002 to 20K. That's a total of 220,000 miles with not one front end problem. I replaced about 15 sets of rotors, just so everyone knows I don't baby them. My 92 got new rotors the first week I owned it. I also had a 98R/T for about 16K. I never got to drive it much. I bought it for my girl friend. She blew the transmission up in it and we her and I broke up I traded it in for a 98 Taurus SHO.
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GraphiteDak
GenIII
2/24/2004
14:45:05
| RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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At least your ex didn't get to leave with your Dak! Hey, what engine did your 98 SHO come with? Just curious.
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eddy
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
2/24/2004
17:54:06
| RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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Once again, it's a faulty argument to try to say you've had good luck based on COMBINED mileage. That dont mean nothin to me. By that argument I could add up all the mileages on all the trouble free DAkotas that ever existed in the world and use THAT to try to support an argument that it's a perfect truck.
Hold ONE TRUCK to over 100K without trouble then maybe you could come here talkin about how other people's problems must be due to bad maintenance or bad driving. But as long as you ditch your vehicles before your warranty runs out and don't have any experience with holding a truck for more than a couple years, I have trouble seeing how you could even try to comment on problems other people are having who don't change trucks as often as shoes.
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Jon P.
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
2/24/2004
18:19:25
| RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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I think the problem comes from the factory itself. I bought my 01 new, and around
13,000 miles I noticed the clunking noise under the front end. I drive all highway
miles and I don’t drive my truck hard. I also don’t turn wheel lock to wheel lock.
I changed out the upper right ball joint for Moog’s aftermarket greasable ball joint.
When I took out the factory ball joint it wiggled around loosely and was bone dry. I have not had the front end clunking noise since the change and I now have 64,000 miles on my truck and my driving habits have not changed.
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eddy
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
2/24/2004
18:22:20
| RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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I drove my Ranger to 107 thousand miles. Over bumps. Over high curbs. Abused the hell out of it. Turned the wheel to full lock in both directions all the time. And the front end was still like new when I got rid of it.
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WipLash
R/T
2/24/2004
21:36:25
| RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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Graph,
It had Fords 3.4L v8 version of Yammaha's 3.0L V6. It was a very small V8, but it was RPM happy. The 98's only came with autos. It had black ext. with the tan leather interior. It was the best looking Ford sedan ever made.
When I bought the 98R/T I had no intentions of even driving it much. It was practically brand new. It had 3000 miles on it and it was a year old. It was going to be my toy. Well, my girl friend moved in with me and she was having to commute 80 miles round trip each day. Her car's transmission went out. Since I had a spare vehicle and I only lived 4 miles from my job I had to let her take my R/T temporarily so she could go to work. I would have driven the R/T and let her take my car, but my car was a beater that was my "work car". I tend to get very greasy at work. Besides, I don't know how many times I heard, "you love that truck more than you do me!" So, I let her drive the damn thing for 5 months!!! God, I should have had my head examined!
She ragged on that truck as hard as she could every second she was behind the wheel. I went weeks at a time where I filled the tank everyday!Even my dad saw her in town one day squaling the tires pulling out of Wal-Mart. She finally burnt the transmission up and that was it. I kicked her ass out. I towed the truck to the dealership and they replacd the trans under warranty. It never drove right after that. I think she did some internal damage to the engine. In 5 months she racked 16,000 miles on that truck.
I was back at the dealership one day to have the paint on the hood repaired where she hit something and there sat a 98SHO with 20K on it for $8,000.00. There was a guy standing there wanting my R/T. Now you know the rest of the story.
I had no idea that the 98's were so rare. I found out later that those trucks were built to order only. 1999 was actually the first full production year. That's why you never see a 98 R/T on here.
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WipLash
R/T
2/24/2004
22:01:55
| RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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Message:
Eddy,
Well, take my 92, 93, 94, and 2001 Daks and you have 183,000 miles between those 4. That's 46,000 miles average on each. No front end problems. Yeah, if I kept them to 100,000 and beyond I might have a problem. Your going to have some kind of problem on any vehicle past 100,000 miles. That's why I get rid of them! Quit crying about it.
Besides, how hard can it be to replace a ball joint? What, $35.00, 3 or 4 hours labor, and a 12 pak of beer. Sounds like a good excuse to get out of the house.
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eddy
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
2/25/2004
10:31:59
| RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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Once again... your 183K is absolutely meaningless. You're talking like it's the same accomplishment as putting it all on the same truck. It absolutely is not.
Im not whining about my truck, my 04 is absolutely perfect so far. Im just taking issue with you having the nerve to try to accuse people of causing the ball joint problem with faulty maintenance or bad driving because since you haven't experienced it in 183 thousand miles spread across like 6 trucks then that must mean it's not a real factory defect. That's just a faulty argument you're using, that's all.
Like I said... once you're in the club of people who don't run away from a vehicle as soon as they become financially responsible for all repairs, THEN you might have something worthwhile to say. And I don't care how hard it is to replace a joint. There's NO REASON why vital suspension components should be failing in under 50K if the truck isn't driven off road and you dont regularly fly over speed bumps at 60mph. Little itty bitty front drive cars manage to go to well over 100K without any suspension problems, I dont know why it's such a problem for certain pickups nowadays.
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99rt
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
2/25/2004
12:47:30
|  RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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I saw an artical on TV about Durangos...then Dakotas about upper ball joint problems, and the wheels breaking off. I checked my 99 RT by pulling the top side of the tire and sure enough the wheel had about 3/16" of play. I went to the local O'Riely auto parts store and bought a set of Moog "problem solver" ball joints (have a grease Zerk in them) and drilled off the old ones and put these in. Upon closer examination the OEM ball joints had little to no grease in them. I'm putting this post up to let anybody know that you should check your front wheels and replace your ball joints BEFORE you encounter a major problem down the road. My truck had 48000 miles on it when I replaced the ball joints.
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WipLash
R/T
2/25/2004
13:54:29
| RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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Message:
Eddy,
Your missing my point. Almost everyone that has posted complaints about ball joint failure has had less than 35,000 miles on their truck. There is onlt 2 trucks in my series of trucks that have less the 35,000 miles and I still have one of them. Just read the all the post. 90% of all of them have less than 35,000 miles on them. So, by 35,000 I should have a problem. Since it is supposedly a design flaw, I should have had 4 Dakotas that I had to replace the ball joints on. The one Dakota with 61,000 should have needed 2 sets of balljoits. As hard as I drive my trucks, I can't imagine anyone having more problems with their front ends than I. Also, up until 2001 I lived in Arkansas. Arkansas was in the top 10 for the worst highways and interstates up until last year. In 2000 Arkansas had the #1 ranking for worse interstates. I cut down 2 tires in 3 months on I40 about 40 miles west of Memphis in 2001. That was just from hitting pot holes on I40 at 75mph. Still no damage to the truck.
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JES
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
2/25/2004
15:14:51
| RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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WipLash -- sounds like you got lucky. Maybe you're the exception, not the rule.
Eric
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WipLash
R/T
2/25/2004
19:31:13
| RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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I also failed to mention that I had a paper rout in 94-95. That's why the 94 had 61K miles on it. I was delivering in a bad neighborhood that had very poor streets. It was a high crime neighborhood also. I had over 230 papers to deliver each day and over 300 to deliver on Sundays. Because of the high crime rate my route required that I pull into each driveway and place the paper as close to the dront doorstep as possible. Over half the driveways had a curb I had to drive over at the road's side. I claimed over 35,000 miles on my taxes for the 18 months I did that paper rout. It was very brutal not only to the front end but also to the transmission and brakes. The only things that gave me problems were the front brake rotors.
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JES
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
2/26/2004
07:30:29
| RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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Regardless of who has and hasn't had problems with their balljoints and when they had said problems is of less importance to me than the fact that mine failed at 29,000 miles and were replaced with the same type of junk part and are likely to fail every 30,000 miles unless I go out of my way to spend the money to bring my $31k truck up to the level of the $14k truck that I had previously. Way to go Dodge -- way to make Ford look that much better.
Eric - http://photos.yahoo.com/jes_96
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00R/T CC
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
2/26/2004
19:58:42
| RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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Message:
Quit crying and trade it in on a Ranger then.
Geez!
My R/T: 43,000 miles, no new ball joints, no new rotors, still have 2 of 4 original tires, even. Not babied/not hammered, just driven and enjoyed.
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Joe
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
2/26/2004
22:00:05
| RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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I have a 97 Dak with 124,000 miles & I just purchased a set of Moog greasable joints. The factory ones have made noise for a while but I haven't lost a wheel or anyhting. I can't keep the truck in alignment anymore it seems the original joints are worn and are throwing the tow in way off.
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JES
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
2/27/2004
10:00:18
| RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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00R/T CC - thanks for the advice. Already had the Ranger ... twas a little too small. I'm thinking F-150 Crew Cab. Sorry to say it, but this Dodge is the first vehicle I've ever owned that I was disappointed in. Oh well .. live and learn. Again -- thanks for the advice 00R/T CC.
Eric
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WipLash
R/T
2/27/2004
20:04:57
| RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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Message:
Jes,
I guess that's your call. You get the Ford and you may find that there is something wrong with it that you can't live with. I've owned more than 20 cars over the last 20 years. Half of those were Dodges. I have had only 2 vehicles that I had no gripes about and that was the 93 5.2L Dakota and the 95 Turbo AWD Talon. I would have kept both of those vehicles for as long as I could, but I totaled both of them. I can't win for loosing.
In other words, if the ball joints are your only gripe go buy you 4 ball joints for $150.00, install them and then pay a shop $50.00 to align the front end. Then you will be done. $200.00 is all we're talking here. I agree that you shouldn't have to do that, but you're rolling the dice again when you go trade for the Ford. At least you know what you got right now and it's pretty easy to fix.
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JES
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
2/27/2004
22:35:30
| RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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Message:
Ya WipLash .. ur probably rite. I'll probably keep the DAK til the 7/70 runs out and try to replace all the crap parts with some decent aftermarket ones and see how that treats me. I guess I'm just spoiled by having good luck w/ vehicles. Perfect example - '76 Super Beetle w/ 86,000 miles on it .. bought it for $800 when I was 16 ... knew the alt was bad when i bought it so i bought an alternator for $25 at a junkyard ... drove it for 49,000 miles over three years and maintained it properly ... never had to replace one single part. Similar case with my 81 Toyota PU, 93 Mazda MX-6, and 94 Ranger Splash SC. Oh well .. this DAK would be pretty sweet if it was just reliable. I'll just have to hunker down and put some good parts on her and see how she treats me. Time will tell.
Eric -- http://photos.yahoo.com/jes_96
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WipLash
R/T
2/28/2004
01:46:56
| RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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How did you like that SPLASH? I almost bought one. When I was getting ready to trade my 92 4x4 Dak, the Splash had just been out about a year and I really liked them. I was a Dodge man heart & Soul but the Splash was the best looking small truck on the road at the time. I was trying to strike a deal at the Ford dealership for a Blue (go figure) RC 4.0L 5spd Splash. They wouldn't even come close to paying off my trade and they wouldn't come down off their asking price of the Splash. I told them what the Dodge dealer already offered me for my truck on a trade-in and they called me a liar. I SAID F^CK YOU TO!! I drove down the streat 2 blocks and traded for the 93 5.2L CC Dak. I came back 3 hrs later to that Ford dealership and showed them my new Dodge Dakota. Who knows, if the Ford dealers hadn't been such pricks, I might have converted to a Ford Lover. NAAAAA!
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bomrat
Dodge Dakota
JOIN HERE
2/21/2005
18:37:43
|  RE: BALL JOINT COMPLAINTS!
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this is an update to my 2003 dodge dakota r/t...
35k on the truck and i now have a rattle in my front passenger wheel.. I jacked up the car and i have over a 3/4 inch of lateral movement in the wheel. bad ball joint, or at least a failing one. i took it to dodge, and they said that is still within specs and don't worry about it. i looked for the ball joints at my local autoparts place and they are 85 bucks for the lower ones and 55 for the upper ones. for that i guess i will wait for the tire to go then take it in.. this is my 2 cents worth.
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