My wife took our '02 Durango in to get get oil change and alignment at NTB and they pointed out to her that the ball joints were worn and the hub bearings needed to be replaced. So we took it over to the Dodge dealership and they have had it all weekend. I call this morning and they say they are going to replace the ball joints, but the hub bearings are not covered by this "recall/extended warranty" or whatever they are calling it...and it's not covered by the Extended Warranty I purchased with the vehicle either.

I have a couple questions. First of all...it doesn't sound like something that would be terribly difficult to change. I've change the hubs on my Jeep before...but an 81 Jeep and an 02 Durango are probably a bit different. Does anyone know if this is a pretty easy driveway fix?

Also...should I be raising more hell about the ball joints possibly causing this? Does that make sense? The dood at the dealership is trying to tell me that I could have hit a pot hole and flattened one of the bearings and that could have caused it...or something else...but it's not related to the ball joints. What do you guys think?

Thanks fellas. I'm new to the board...just thought I would seek you guys out and see if other DD owners are familiar with this.

jp

 

JP,

I'm currently having the smae problem, but I have a '99 so I'm quite literally screwed as the recall on the ball joints doesn't apply to me. The balljoints are shot, the Hub Assembly needs to be replaced my guess isn't great I got a feeling that due to ball joint failure on mine (frigin mopar they'd better recall it or I'm gonna raise hell every day I'm still here at the dealership), lead to increased stress on the hub assembly (and some how a messed up wheel bearing that's making a ton of noise and driving me nuts), causeing that to fail. I don't got the money to swap out ball joints, hub assemblies, a wheel bearing, and an idler arm. Good luck getting dodge to fix anything for free.

Semper Fidelis

PS: As far as raising hell goes I'm all for it let me know how it goes.

 

No connection between the ball joints and hub bearing wear. The hub assemblies would be a PITA to change in the driveway, real simple but require some fairly expensive tools and they are REAL tight, 180 ft lbs if I recall. You won't get the main hub nut loose with a 50-peice Craftsman tool kit.