Hi guys,

My truck (2003 2wd 1500) has had recent front end problems, starting with a wheel bearing going out followed by my steering rack developing a lot of slop. Over the past year I have replaced the following:
-both wheel front bearings with timken units
-newish steering rack (no more slop)
-new front and rear monroe reflex shocks
-new sway bar bushings (mopar units, moog ones I tried were binding)
-new sway bar end links (moog greaseable units, greased multiple times)

I have inspected the ball joints for slop and they seem fine although they are original with 119k mi on the clock.

Now my problem: everytime I go over a bump or drive on a rough road the front end makes a popping noise or a noise like clunking two pieces of wood together. It seems to happen everytime a bump tries to make the cab roll (especially bad when one tire hits a pot hole for instance). All signs are pointing me to the sway bar end links as when removing the sway bar removed my noise. The noise was present before I replaced the end links with moog units too.

What do you guys think, are these moog units known to be noisy or did I fudge up the installation? My only other thought is that I have a bad ball joint and the sway bar is causing the ball joint to clunk (from the upward pressure). This noise is driving me crazy though, your thoughts to fixing the problem are appreciated!

 

I would start with ball joints.

 

So I pinpointed it to the sway bar end links, which are brand new moog units. With the truck raised on ramps I had a buddy stand on the side steps and rock the cab back and forth, recreating the popping noise. Both end links have play in their cup and ball joint, it's nothing that tightening bolts can fix. Wtf are these POS, anyone else had problem with moog greasable joints?

 

If you're sure they are installed properly then they just be bad.....common, no, they're a good joint and rarely have an immediate issue. Easy to tell if you remove them though, there will still be play in the joint without a load on it.