On Wed, February 22, 2006 7:54 am, Garret Lewis wrote:
>
> The tire shop said that I needed new upper and lower ball joints on my
> Dakota yesterday. They quoted me a price of $888.06 installed. $439.00 of
> that quote was labor. I was reading my Haynes manual about it and it does
> seem like a fairly extensive job; however, I really don't want to pay
> $888.06 for my truck repair. Has anyone replace the upper and lower ball
> joints themselves? If so, how difficult/"pain in the butt" is the job?
> Additionally, are there any "tricks of the trade" when you do it?
They're not too bad. On my 2000, the uppers are held in by 3 rivets and the
lowers are held by 4 rivets. I used an air hammer to shave the heads off the
rivets and then a punch (in the air hammer) to drive them out of the holes.
It took about 25 minutes per joint IIRC. The new ones will attach with grade
8 bolts and locknuts.
If you don't have airtools it'll be much more time consuming. I would guess
the easiest way would be to use some sort of grinder to grind the rivets out,
or maybe you could drill them. Good luck.
Be sure to get an alignment done after you replace them.
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. . .------------------------------------------------------------------. | Make your plans NOW to attend the National DML Meet in Colorado! | | Date: July 15-23, 2006 - More info: http://meet.dakota-truck.net | `------------------------------------------------------------------'
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