Allowable play in ball joints

[Remington92]

Took my pickup into the local mom and pop shop for a once over and see if they could diagnose my loose steering. Their verdict was ball joints are shot. Trucks has 135k mi and no telling if they’ve ever been changed. After doing some reading it sounds like dodges have a spec for allowable up and down play. You can see how much these move from the wear mark. Does this look out of spec? 

[Remington92]

Also what’s the current recommendation for ball joints? Haven’t pulled it apart yet to see if the currents are oversized 

[98whitelightnin]

Does it have a spot for a grease zerk on the underside of the knuckle? Mine have a little plug that I can turn out and add a zerk for greasing.

[Dieselfuture]

If it's about 16th of an inch up down it's probably ok, side to side should be zero. I changed mine with a little play up down because I was doing wheel bearing anyway but when put new ones in the had about same play as original with 150k + on them. 

Lose steering is probably more likely track bar, tierods, steering box, or stabilizer shock in that order. Jmo

[dripley]

I have thru 2 sets of oe aluminum rims. 5 or 6 of them cracked. 

My ball joints passed saftey early this year 1/16" mabe a bit more up and down. As far as brand thats a pretty wide open topic. I put Moog on mine 8 or 9 years ago. Nobody has anything good to say about Moog anymore but mine have held up well.

 

@Dieselfuture, whats the weight rating on those 4th gen wheels and tires?

[Dieselfuture]

8 hours ago, dripley said:

Dieselfuture, whats the weight rating on those 4th gen wheels and tires

Honestly I don't know. They came off a 2012 srw3500 I would think quite a bit , I remember @AH64ID saying something about 17" had lower ratings. I don't think it's rims themselves, more to do with tires.

[AH64ID]

7 minutes ago, Dieselfuture said:

Honestly I don't know. They came off a 2012 srw3500 I would think quite a bit , I remember @AH64ID saying something about 17" had lower ratings. I don't think it's rims themselves, more to do with tires.

 

17" tires do have limited weight ratings of 3195lbs. There are a few that are currently above that number, but as they go thru redesign and certification they have to drop to 3195lbs. 

 

I've never seen a weight rating on the 3rd gen 17's, but I've also never seen an issue with them when loaded up to 4K lbs on the older 17's with higher load ratings. 

[Evan]

My 17" 3rd gen aluminium are working well but honestly with a gooseneck in tow they aren't worked that hard.

 

To me those ball joints look shot. But I'd go ahead and run them till they start popping making corners then I'd probly slow my cornering alittle to keep them from popping  wait that is what I did. Lol. 

Mine went over 180k th ed n got very bad I put napa joints on now one is shot after about 50k I've been dragging my feet to change it out.

[dripley]

The main reasons I kept my 16's were price and bigger selection of tires. Doesn take me long to burn thru a set.

[Remington92]

Ive got one tire that has a very slow leak i need to get looked at. (loses pressure over a few weeks) hopefully its the tire and not wheels already. Hopefully these are oem ball joints and not knurled enlarged ones. Reading it sounds like Ac delco pro or spicer are the way to go for affordable options. 

[dave110]

My Spicers went a whole 12k miles before crapping out. I won't use them again. I have Delco's in now and so far I'm happy with them. I've been using more and more Delco stuff since switching to Rock Auto.

[dripley]

a couple of other folks here have used the spicers with bad results. I would look elsewhere.

[Mopar1973Man]

Moog and Spicer are junk. Like myself I've got a cheap set of AC Delco's in my truck still going strong. 

[Evan]

16" tires are more common? 

[dripley]

20 minutes ago, Evan said:

16" tires are more common? 

Seemed to be when I was thinking about swaping to them a good many years back. Plus the 16's had higher weight ratings on them and are bit cheaper. About $25 a tire.

[Evan]

I'm not sure that's the case today

[dripley]

1 hour ago, Evan said:

I'm not sure that's the case today

You might be right today. Just did a quick search on the cooper tire I run my truck and discount tire says they do not offer a comprable 17" tire, 265 70r 17, in the ATP that I have run for many years. Did not check any where else. Wanted to compare price and weight rating. My current ones are rated for 3415 at 80 psi. And as I said before before they were more last time I checked. Dont know about today. 

[Russ Roth]

I have Nitto Duragrapplers on mine.  285/75x17, 3rd Gen rims.  Weight rated @ 3,970 lbs.  Like them very well and seem to wear great.  Can't really tell since I have 7 on rims and rotate all of them.  Gonna run the oldest ones out this year.  That happened because I got hit in rear axle when some kid was playing with his phone and ran a red.  Knocked rear axle out on drivers side of my '01 and while it did not damage the wheel the sidewall was punctured.  I ended up buying a second set of wheels and another set of new tires.  There were about 40,000 on first set and looked to easily go 60-70 plus.

[AH64ID]

12 hours ago, dripley said:

You might be right today. Just did a quick search on the cooper tire I run my truck and discount tire says they do not offer a comprable 17" tire, 265 70r 17, in the ATP that I have run for many years. Did not check any where else. Wanted to compare price and weight rating. My current ones are rated for 3415 at 80 psi. And as I said before before they were more last time I checked. Dont know about today. 

 

You should just go to cooper's website.

 

265/70R17 is a popular OEM size and available in the Cooper ATP. 

 

Sounds like Discount has discounted their knowledge. On a side note I won't use Discount tire, they have yet to be cheaper with better road hazard coverage for the same tires. 

 

  

6 hours ago, Russ Roth said:

I have Nitto Duragrapplers on mine.  285/75x17, 3rd Gen rims.  Weight rated @ 3,970 lbs.  Like them very well and seem to wear great.  Can't really tell since I have 7 on rims and rotate all of them.  Gonna run the oldest ones out this year.  That happened because I got hit in rear axle when some kid was playing with his phone and ran a red.  Knocked rear axle out on drivers side of my '01 and while it did not damage the wheel the sidewall was punctured.  I ended up buying a second set of wheels and another set of new tires.  There were about 40,000 on first set and looked to easily go 60-70 plus.

 

One of the last few tires in a 17" rated above 3195 lbs. One of these days they will likely get dropped to 3195lbs as well. 

Edited November 21, 2019 by AH64ID

[dripley]

1 hour ago, AH64ID said:

 

You should just go to cooper's website.

 

265/70R17 is a popular OEM size and available in the Cooper ATP. 

 

Sounds like Discount has discounted their knowledge. On a side note I won't use Discount tire, they have yet to be cheaper with better road hazard coverage for the same tires. 

Just did a real quick search yesterday. One reason I go with DT is the number of locations. Makes dealing with road hazard easier for me since I always seem to be somewhere else with problems when I buy local. Though a lady hit me in Iowa,  no DT there, and I did not bring the tire home. DT replaced for free anyway on my word.