Yeah, I cleaned the antiseize off everything except the lower BJ taper. That was the only thing that would torque down without turning endlessly in the socket.... and it's the hardest one to pop loose. The torque is most important so there isn't too much stress on the joints, which could cause early failure or binding. I got it all done Friday night and took the truck for an alignment yesterday. Shop said it was way off and they were right, because the tires were humming till I got it aligned.

BTW, I didn't use a hammer to pop things loose, used this cheap HF tie rod puller. It worked for the lower BJ too. You just have to slide it on at a skinny area, then move it down to the BJ.




My quest to make the front end feel perfect is moving along. Next, I want to change the intermediate steering shaft and address the little PS pump whine I'm getting. The whine is low level and can be lived with, but I dislike it.

 

Just updating this thread on the outcome of using these Napa basic lower ball joints.

I'll be honest, I have pretty much abused these things by not greasing them. I did grease them when I installed them back in 2015, but hadn't touched them since and the front end is still tight as heck. The junkyard uppers have been flawless... I greased them with a grease needle back then.

So, the here is the deal...the metal parts have held up quite well on the Napas... the rubber, not so much. The rubber boots have cracked and split around the circumference of the boot. Being empty of grease may have contributed to that, but I more think it's the cheap rubber. I finally tried to grease them yesterday and grease came spilling out of one of the cracks. That is a bead of grease forming on the right in my pic, but it was a lot more before I cleaned it.

Really didn't feel like doing this again, so I came up with a fix. I let the grease spill out to it's content overnight, then I squeezed out a little more so the area would be dry. I then cleaned the boot with a toothbrush and brake cleaner. Then I used Permatex black to seal the crack all around, pushing the product into the crack. Waited an hour and gave it one more heavy bead of Permatex around the crack. The truck will stay on jack stands overnight while the stuff dries. Simple and effective. Permatex has a pretty tenacious hold when used on clean rubber and black is oil resistant. If I were to buy these cheapies again, I'd coat the boots in Permatex before using.

 

You know I haven't looked at my ball joint boots yet I replaced half in 2010 then rest in 2011 with Raybestos basic models I wonder how they look? The cheap links feel ok front still solid my KYB shocks have softened up some never liked them 100% but decent stiff shocks but a little too stiff.

I always preferred a stiff ride over a soft mushy smooth ride I think most people would conceder my truck too stiff for comfort but I like it wish I had Bilstein shocks over the KYB'S.

 

You're worse than me then, if you haven't greased them since. I noticed the state of mine when I was doing the last oil change. Part of it was that my grease gun had broken shortly after install and hadn't gotten around to ordering another. I bought a Lincoln grease gun on Ebay finally.

Your truck looks good underneath though. Very clean.