It's really nice here in Indiana this weekend, the negative temps were replaced by upper 40 lower 50's. I take my happy little butt (little is a relative term, little compared to the death star) to the dealership to get an alignment. I've had a bad pull for a few weeks and want to get it taken care of. I wait around for alittle bit just to learn some wonderful news. My drivers side lower BJ is loose, can't be aligned because of that and my passenger side tire (the side that's out of spec) is so bald on the inside that belts are showing !!!!!

FUN FUN FUN I now get the pleasure of replacing the ball joint and tires. Can't be too mad though, I got 54k out of the factory tires. Going to head over to the parts shop tomorrow for a new moog lower bj. Already emailed a buddy who works for a 4x4 store so new tires will be on the way in the next few days.

All that for the one question I have. I'd like to move up a size which would be a 33 or so. Just want to make sure that I won't have to worry about lifting it yet. I don't think I will since you can fit 35"s with a leveling kit but just wanted to confirm...And share the story of my wonderful Saturday.

I need rum

 

That sucks man sorry to hear about your ball joint needing to be replaced. I think the aftermarket ones come with grease fitting though. Truck info? 2wd? 4wd? year?

 

It's an 05 4x4. I don't think it's going to be too hard to replace...just didn't want to have to do that already. Oh well...life happens. It really sucks that this has forced me to get new bigger tires...dang!

 

Atleast your not paying $900 for ball joints, and then getting leveling struts installed but the f#$@ers at the dealer put them back at the 0" lift setting and have to get it fixed next week so till then you gotta run around un-alligned like me...... Rough month so far

 

Wow that sucks!!

It seems that several people on here are not getting a lot of life out of the ball joints. It's pretty disappointing. I found a small hole in one of my lower ball joints this summer. I patched it up but I'm sure I got a decent amount of dirt in there so I'm sure I'm on barrowed time.

 

Yeah, that sucks bad!

I went to Advanced and ordered a new Moog lower bj. I was going to buy a haynes manual too BUT it just said that the lower was non-serviceable and you needed to buy a whole new control arm. According to this and other sites though that's bs. So i'm going to need some additional info. How do you replace the lower bj? I know i'll have to take the knuckle off and press it out, what about torque #'s?

Advance Auto repair guide says 98ft/lbs. Think I should go ahead an get the Haynes manual too? It would probably tell me everything I need to know other than you can actually replace just the bj? Do you really have to disconnect the tie rod as well?

 

Your truck cannot fit 35s without a leveling kit. I never saw where you said you had one.
What kind of tires you getting?

 

Oops sorry for the confusion. I'm not going up to a 35" tire, just a 33 or so. I'll be towing my 93 SAS'd explorer behind it eventually so I don't want to go much bigger than that. Also don't have the coin to regear it right now and figured 33"s wouldn't hurt the little 4.6 too much.

As far as brand of tires go i'm not sure. I was looking at the Toyo open country at's but i'm not sure. Going to see what my buddy can do for me.

 

with the 4.6 if you do go 35's, get a tuner and you will be pleased and be back to stock power roughly. but if your towing a vehicle stick with 33's, i had a 800 lb engine in the bed of my truck today coming home and it was noticable, truck wasn't sluggish but on steep hills it was obvious i had something in the back. i will be towing my fj40 eventually behind my truck and will either need gearing done, or efans and underdrive pulleys atleast

 

Yeah, i figured 33"s would be a small enough change as to not really effect it, but make it look alittle better. I'm just going to see where the prices fall and then make my decision whether or not to move up alittle. This summer i'd really like to put a new SIDO exhaust on it and dump it out the side before the rear tire. I love the way that looks! And do the Gotts mod on my intake. Hopefully before the end of the year I can get a tuner as well.

Anyone replaced the lower BJ on these? Shortcuts? Tips and tricks?

 

You could save some money by NOT buying the toyos. They're pretty expensive (At least the MTs I looked at) Then you can look into getting that exhaust sooner!

 

I highly recommend the Goodyear Silent Armour if you are wanting some good A/T's that are reasonably priced.

I picked up a set of 265/70/17 (32" tall) for my SUV last Friday. I love them. Excellent traction and they ride very nicely. I paid $860 for a set here in Hawaii...so I'll bet you can get them for about $600 on the Mainland.



sucks about the lower ball joints. You gonna change both sides while your in there?

 

Well this was a weird day. I decided to take the damaged passenger side front tire off and rotate a good one in. I broke an adapter and a jerry rigged socket wrench trying to get a lug nut off the rear. I get a new 21mm 1/2" drive socket though and go to work on a different tire. I replace the front driverside tire with the spare and move the original driverside tire to the passenger (where the badly damaged tire was).

I get it done and decide to take it for a quick test drive. Before if I let go of the steering wheel the truck would immediately dart to the right. With that tire off though I can let go of the wheel and it tracks straight as a freakin arrow. Just like the day I drove it off the dealership lot! I'm going to take it to a tire shop tomorrow and have them look at the alignment, and verify that I have a bad ball joint. I'm really not too confident in the stealerships diagnosis now. The original tire was in HORRIBLE shape...it was a serious accident waiting to happen. Think that could be the extent of my problems? I think i'm just going to rotate in my spare tire and get a couple new ones since I already have 1 fairly new tire in the rear.

 

sounds like a plan...depending on how old your spare tire.


I used to do that with my muscle cars. buy 2 new tires about every 1 to 1.5 yrs...if they made it that long. just kept throwing the new ones on front, and rotating older ones to the back