For the '99 that Chris has, I believe that the ball joints are servicable.
It wasn't until 2k that they decided to use the biggest rivets I've ever
seen to secure the ball joints about an inch past the end of the control
arm. You can get ball joints for a '99 for about $60 a piece. I used to
have the moog part numbers somewhere........
I have a 2k and greasable ball joints would have saved me 8 control arms in
36k miles. I'm slightly worried now that I'm out of warranty....
-Josh
2000 CC V6
<Tubamirbls@aol.com> wrote in message news:159.176293b7.2b031ee2@aol.com...
>
> Hi Chris
> It's hard to say one way or the other if you were overcharged. The
shop
> rate per hour where I live is pushing $100 so at least this didn't happen
to
> you while visiting the San Francisco Bay area!
> As you know, any shop including a Chrysler product dealer's can
either
> price a job on the basis of the time the mechanic actually spent or charge
> you the flat rate manual's time. I've never found a shop that tells me
this
> when I come to pay the bill and you don't see the time clock punching IN
and
> OUT that the mechanic actually did to track the time he spent on your
turck.
> I guess this is at the discretion of the policy by which the shop is run.
> If they had to remove the complete suspension on both your front
wheels
> to replace the upper and lower ball jts (what about the tierod ends on
both
> sides??) which of course would also require a full front end alignment
when
> completed maybe a guy could spend 5hrs doing that.......I don't know???
You
> have a few bucks tied up in parts here too since Dakotas after they
> eliminated servicable ball jts (they became factory sealed) involve
> replacement of the complete support arms upper and lower if the ball jt is
> worn.
> I still feel that leaving a zerk fitting on the 4 ball jts and the 2
> tierod ends could have given all of us Dakota owners a good many more
trouble
> free miles on our front suspension parts
> Paul Sahlin
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Fri Feb 06 2004 - 11:47:26 EST