I'm kind of involved with setting-up a towing operation around here, and was just told of a MAJOR probem with late Ford trucks, that's too ridiculous NOT to pass along!
One truck is an '08 with 40,000 miles, maybe 10k in actual towing.
Went to a Ford Dealer for an alignment, and they CAN'T DO IT!!
ALL 4 FRONT BALL JOINTS HAVE BETWEEN 1/4 AND 1/2 INCH OF PLAY!!
"I've seen this as early as 20k miles" service writer told me!! "after 36k the warrantee doesn't cover it, and it's $1000+ on a customer pay!"
SEALED BALL-JOINTS ON A H/D TRUCK!!!!! REPLACED WITH THE SAME, AND NO WARRANTEE ON THE 2ND SET!!!

Now WTF - how many of us have vehicles with over 100k and good ball joints???
Can't see how they can get away with this!!!!!!!!

TELL EVERYONE !!

 

It's no worse than the balljoint/tierods/pitman arm problems late 90s S-10 based 4WD had. 'Course by the time those became common knowledge, there I was with a Bravada that had to have the whole damn front end rebuilt at 80k miles. And when I got shet of it at 165k, it needed it all again.

It does make you wonder what the manufacturers are thinking when they approve this stuff for production. They're hedging a bet the vehicle will get out of warranty first.

 

My Charger at just around 100,000 miles had to have the ball joints and tie rods replaced. The factory ball joints were sealed units, the replacement ones are Moog and have grease fittings. Still cost close to $1000.00 to have all that done.

 

My 1999 F150 got 130,000 miles out of the ball joints....and 10 years out of the battery.

 

My 2001 F150 got 205,000km out of ball joints. Still have the original tie rods.

 

My 2000 Dakota had over 100,000 Km's, on it when the lower balljoints were replaced. However they were done on a recall by Dodge.No Charge.

 

I had 84k on my 02 F150 with no ball joint/tie rod replacement issues. However, the exhaust manifold bolts (4 of them) just broke off in the heads without me ever touching them. Exhaust leak was terrible and I got rid of it because it was going to cost $4200-6700 to fix it by either replacing the heads or the entire engine. Evidently it was a common problem.