A Newby Asks: Outer Tie Rod End Lubrication?

[RUSSELL5000]

The maintenance schedule says that the outer tie rod end should be lubricated every 7,500 miles. The service manual offers the following (overwhelmingly helpful – HA-HA!!) procedure:



“Any time the outer tie rod end is disconnected from the knuckle, before assembly, clean all old grease and debris from the boot with a clean cloth and apply outer tie rod grease P/N 68088623AA (1) to the boot (2) as shown (and there is a line drawing). ”



Does this mean I need to disconnect the outer tie rod end from the knuckle every 7,500 miles? According to the service manual that is quite the job and requires two special tools.



I sure hope I have this all wrong – seems ridiculous. Why not have a grease zerk?



Thanks.

 

[EDankievitch]

Our Tierod ends are Lubed for life. No zerk fittings. I will say the newer (08 and later) system seems to hold up quite well. I had over 130,000 miles on the kit I installed on the 05 that I had. everything was just as tight as the day I installed it when I traded the truck in. I move a lot of trailers a lot of steering at low speeds backing. If there was a test of how well something was going to last the use my truck gets is it. That said the manuals are written by people that have never turned a wrench or even looked under the hood. Most have no clue what they are writing about. They have the job because they can spell much better than I can... lol

 

[RUSSELL5000]

Thanks much, ED.



I made the (apparently ridiculous and incorrect) assumption that if something was on the factory maintenance schedule that you should do it. I'll bet this has been on there for twenty plus years and nobody ever updated it in accordance with the change in components.



I won't worry about.



Thanks again.

 

[RikDavis]

For whatever it is worth a drilled and tapped the sealed ball joints on my 99 2 WD so I could install grease fittings. I grease the truck myself and I have never replaced a front end part in 576,000 miles.
The 2013 4x4 looks like it would be harder to do