Well moto never came back and said whether the links ordered worked for his 2005. I'll try to PM him but would venture to guess they worked otherwise he would have been right back on the forum complaining about it. Rockauto still only lists them for the 2006+. The darn links appear to be my trouble too. There is noise while rocking the truck. I can also rock the truck pretty well by turning the steering wheel slightly back and forth while driving, almost like it is waving at the other cars. After a short inspection the links don't appear to be snapped off, but they are pencil thin with some rust.

Sucks its 14 degrees F outside. Perhaps I can bribe the neighbor and use his heated garage. This is going to bug the crap out of me until it is fixed...


**edit
well I looked a little closer and really don't see anything broken. Do you guys see any problems in the pics?
DSC00239.jpg

DSC00238.jpg

 

Had one go on '05' dakota about 15k and another about 40k.
I could only find them at the dealer because of there length...they are about a 1/2 inch longer than aftermaket....replacement at dealer are much beefier than original

 

I know on my '05' dakota the link has a balljoint under the rubber boot.if you look at the pic of the link "motodeficient" put up at the bottom there is a boot with a ball joint thats what bad on mine .and also in the pic you can see he snapped the top nut off,which is common (use a cheater bar)..i couldn't tell if it was bad by rocking the truck.
I 'm no mr.goowrench and was able to do it with no jacks(it was alittle tight)there are two straps to keep the swaybar in position.
Best of luck

 

Ahh so even though everything looks ok it could be the ball joint beneath the rubber boot.. I would pull these off to inspect but it sounds like the nut on top will break off. I guess I will just order new links and install them, and if the old ones are still good I could use them for a spare.

I am hoping that this is my trouble, otherwise I don't know WTF the clanging noise is that comes from the front end.

 

Mine went out at 60K. The dealer replacements look nothing like the ones that came from the factory. They look upgraded and thicker, with a different material.

On a side note, when installing new swaybar endlinks, do the following:

DO NOT OVER TORQUE THE TOP NYLOCK NUTS!!!

You WILL break the threaded shaft (meets with the sway bar).

 

Good idea. I would advise anyone who's getting into the front suspension to buy new endlinks before starting. I can almost guarantee if you're taking them off you'll break at least one.

 

Good idea to go ahead and replace them. Doing shocks, a leveling kit...and hopefully figuring out the clunk on mine soon.

It seems that the end links might be the most common, tie rod ends and ball joints after that and at least one person mentioned brake pad hardware. My ball joints and tie rods seem fine from a quick inspection. The clunking seemed worse today, might have been my imagination...

 

Yea bain64 i would just go ahead and do it....i wasn't able to tell until i pulled them off....the top nuts are going to snap off rendering them useless.....but its worth doing them with the newer ones(much better) and hopefully last the life of the truck

 

I wish I would have read this thread ahead of time before starting my leveling kit, I broke both mine and I am at a stand still till Monday.. Cya Slick

 

You can finish the job with the swaybar not attached. Won't hurt anything.

Too bad I got to you too late. When detaching the sway bar, you should always disconnect the links from the lower control arm, removing the nut under the arm. The top nuts by the bar are usually all seized up, and usually always break the end links.....

...which you now know.