i bought my 07 dakota a year ago with 20,000 miles and i now have 31,000 miles on the vehicle. i took it to get an alignment and they told me i have a bad ball joint. i took it to the dealership i bought it from to get it repaired and i asked them to check the front end suspension. it turns out my whole front end suspension needs replacing. struts, strut plate, springs, ball joint, tire rods,... ect. is this a common problem or an isolated issue? note: i have never had any accidents or have done any off-roading with my truck.

 

Definitely not too isolated, there have been others. Definitely not isolated to Dakota's either, or Dodge for that matter. Lots of vehicle have pure junk in the front ends.

There's a line of thinking it goes hand in hand with bad shocks. Get some decent shocks/struts under it, if you haven't, and you may see longer life. Rancho seems to be the way most people are going.

Oh, don't forget to get new sway bar end links while you are replacing things...

 

Lets see on my 05 Dakota before 40,000 upper and lower ball joints, outer tie rod ends, sway bar links and bushings, front wheel bearing shot, rear wheel bearing shot twice, shocks probably went out around 40,000 also just have not replaced them yet, but do have pretty Ranchos in the box rdy to go on. I am sure i have had more done but do not want to think about it

The main thing that i have noticed is that the reason most of these parts are failing is because they are not greasable, moving parts that can not be replenished of grease will fail. Even with greasable parts they will fail eventually, but not as soon.

So to answer your question it is not uncommon and sounds like it will be covered by warranty. I have yet to hear of someone who had to replace the springs because they are bad. I guess its possible. You may want to ask if they can replace the items with greasable parts like the tie rod ends and ball joints, but not sure they will go for that since they are not factory parts.

 

I started to hear a clinging noise from somewhere in the front end. I think i'm going to have to take out the leveling kit in order to take her to the dealer and get the front end checked. She's still under warranty for about 7 or 8,000 more miles of the 36K.

If i leave the leveling kit installed, do you think the dealer will refuse to do warranty work on the truck???

 

Had a ball joint replace because of a torn grease boot. The dealer did it when installing my new Monroe’s but never admitted to it. The New shocks I believe saved the rest of the suspension. The factory shocks where just killing the parts because of constant over the top up/down travel.

 

I haven't replaced any front end suspension components yet...i have 46k miles.

I did do a bunch of steering components, a few racks, a few steering shafts.

I have a feeling my front end is toast though, when I hit ANY small bump in the road, its jarring, and not like a normal pickup truck jarring, I mean like, your driving a giant skate board jarring.

Even the tiniest cracks in the road feel like my truck is about to break apart...

Its terrible. The front struts are probably toast.

 

i hear ya

 

I have 33000 miles or so and i havent had to replace a thing.

 

My truck has just shy of 50,000 miles. I have replaced one front wheel bearing, one tie rod end, and the stock front shocks with Monroes. Everything else is holding together, for now, including the stock brakes.

Rear shocks are coming sometime in the future. The nice Monroes in the front make the harshness of the rears more apparent.