Tie rod inner and outer ends and upper ball jointrs on 06

[B.G. Smith]

Have 82,000 all highway miles and was told that tie rod ends, inner and outer and upper ball joints are loose? Seems a litle early to me. bg

 

[GrantP]

Seems early for the TRE's but I've heard of lots of 3rd gen ball joints failing before 82K. Only way to be sure is to get underneath and have a look. My front end is still tight but I'm only at 37K.

 

[Prairie Dog]

Hard to believe and far too many balljoints are mis-diagnosed by so called experts. My front end is still tight at 94K but I don't off-read and my tires are only slightly larger.
How does it drive? Any odd tire wear? Does it do anything strange in slow turns?

Scott

 

[Wayne M.]

You'll be the first to know if you have bad tie rods in a 4x4 ram. You'll get death wobble most likely. Very unlikely that everything is bad at once. Get another opinion.

 

[Gordo]

Check for a factory recall on the tie rod and the joints. I have an 08, 3500 in which I recently had replaced at no cost to me.

Gord Fuchs
Northfield Center, Ohio

 

[B.G. Smith]

It is two wheel drive. Drove good except slight pull to right after hitting a deep hole in road with right front tire. Caster was out on that side as evidensed by the computer read out on the alignment machine. Right side was 0.8, left side was 0.0 Had outside tread wear on the right front tire. This is all after the fact, think I got soaked pretty good. Old enough to know better and have had experience with alignment shops in the past, they almost always want to replace some ball joints, etc. I just should have checked better before I took it in or at least took it to a different place before having the work done. bg

 

[tobaccogrower]

my passenger side ball joint fell off while pulling into the farm at 73,000. thank god it was not on the highway! new one from napa and couple hours later I was up and running!

 

[cerberusiam]

This is all after the fact, think I got soaked pretty good.

Maybe, maybe not. Depends on what was really wrong with it. The upper BJ is integral to the control arm and if you hit somethig hard enough you bend parts and then you have to fix it. If the camber was out far enough and there was play it is worn and needs replaced. The 2x4 stuff just doe snot look heavy enough to take a beating, would not surprise me they wear out fast.