When I bought my 98Durango a few months ago I absolutely loved it. Now, four months later, I'm feeling a bit of buyer's remorse. Don't get me wrong, when things were smooth sailing with the D it was great, but the current crop of problems are just a bit much for me right now. I noticed a strange noise and some looseness in the steering so I decided to take the D into a mechanic to see what was going on. I was told (as well as shown) that the upper and lower ball joints and both tie rod ends on the driver's side were bad and that the bearing hub assembly was bad on the passenger side. Mechanic quoted me for the labor at $393, saying that the work should take about 6 hours. He broke the cost down by each job, saying that replacing the tie rods wouldcost $78, ball joints $136.50, the bearing hub 84.50, and an alignment at $63.00. All the parts cost about $330, making this $700 job. Now, if the truck had high mileage, I could understand all of this work being necessary but we're only talking 64,600 Miles. Has anyone else ran into these problems with their 98-03 Durango with low(ish) mileage? (aside from the obvious ball joint problems)

 

all those parts u can inspect ur self only cause u never know when the are making things up but in my 98 there is a lose clunk from back to forth i was told this is common in the bushings in the upper and lower steering column

 

They showed me the movement in the ball joints on the driver's side and the wheel bearing on the passenger side. The tie rods, I'm not sure if I'm getting taken on those or not, the mechanic didn't really demonstrate much "looseness" in those. I'm taking it to a different shop to actually get the work done... So, I can always take the parts back if I need to.

 

is yours 4x4

 

Of course. What's the point of buying a big, fuel hungry V-8 SUV if it wasn't a 4x4.

 

lol nothing better it just makes it a little harder to get at the bottom ball joint but that if ur doing it urself

 

The D is going to the shop on Friday morning. Hopefully the mechanic has good news.

 

Well.... I forgot to update after the last visit to the shop. Looks like the ball joints were bad on both sides. Had the mechanic do the passenger's side, and I am taking it back to get them done on the driver's side ASAP.

 

You should have done them yourself. A little labor intensive, but not too difficult. Also, I think he was taking you for your money on the tie end rods and bearings. Just my $.02

 

The bearings were bad, the seals were blown out on the passenger side. I could take pics and post them since I have pics. I live in an apartment complex and have no garage, not to mention it's the middle of January in Wisconsin, andmy lease strictly forbids working on my vehicle in the parking lot (I got a note from management for installing a CAI and checking my fluid levels). As much as I would have loved to just do it myself, since Advanced and Auto Zone do loan out the necessary tools for the lowers, it's just not possible.