Gents,

I have an '07 4x4. About a month and a half ago, while changing my oil, I noticed that the inboard boot on my passenger side cv axle was torn and was spinning grease all over my suspension components.

3 week ends ago, I bought a remanufactured cv axle from Car Quest and installed it.

This Saturday, I noticed grease all over my inner fender well. Upon closer inspection I found...... the inboard boot on my newly installed, remanufactured passenger side cv axle was torn..... actually, it was the same rib of the boot as in the previous boot.

So, naturally, I am hesitant to just go buy another axle and put it in, because it sounds like I may have some issue that is causing these boots to get torn.

Any suggestions would be appreciated ! Please make a comment of something that I could look for !

Thanks in advance.

 

guys.... really could use your help.....76 views and no suggestions.....?

 

any suspension mods done to the truck?

have you done any maintenance to tie-rods or ball joints?

 

I have a leveling spacer installed on the front. I have done doen any maintenance on the tie-rods or ball joints. I do seem to have chronic alignment problems though....... not too terribly bad just always seems to pull to the right more than I prefer.

 

There is your answer. How tall is the spacer?
A spacer leveling kit (say a 3" leveling kit) is going to allow the suspension to droop 3" further than it is designed to, causing the CV joints to exceed their angular design limit. This is stretching the boot beyond design and ripping it. If all you are doing is ripping the boot and not damaging the joint itself I would be somewhat surprised.

This is why I recommend the bilstein 5100 shocks that allow you to lift the front end 2". The shocks are slightly longer than stock, allowing more travel, but it does not allow the suspension to droop enough to put things in a bind.

 

brianjwilson - What you are saying makes sense. However, my spacers are only 2" (if even a full 2"), and have been on the truck for well over a year, but my axle boot problem just began a couple of months ago and seems to be limited to just the passenger side.........

I kinda thought that if the sapcer was the problem, then I would have seen this issue much earlier and that it would be happening on the driver's side as well.....

 

Not sure what the tear is from but you can replace the boot itself for 30 bucks if you are skilled enough to pull the c/v axle off the truck.

If you take the axle to a shop they can most likely change the boot for 30-40 bucks plus the part. With it still on the truck is another story.

I just did this and it costs me 30 bucks for a new boot.

 

Problem with that is, once the boot tears, contamination gets into the CV and it's not going to last.

 

I thought so too until I cut the boot off. Ford really does one hell of a good job completely covering the joint in thick grease. I can understand if you rip it on a mud truck, but on a street truck it really shouldn't be too big of a deal if everything looks ok.

 

You can install an aftermarket boot with more flexibility if you really feel that the only damage is to the boot, like Chris said.
I had a shop install my bilstein 5100s and they tore a CV boot with the bottom of the shock. They wanted to swap out the whole axleshaft (cv to cv) with a re-manufactured part but I told them I wanted my factory joints with a new boot, the new one had a lot more flexibility.

 

Thanks for the posts guys! I really appreciate the comments/suggestions!

I am sad to anounce that I have not yet made the time to address this situation. I plan to take the truck by a local offroad shop and discuss the situation with them.

If they recognize anything crazy, I'll let y'all know.