Yeah it must just be with 3rd gens because this summer I put ball joints on my dad's 98 1500 and it has had 180,000 trouble free miles[8D]

 

All my tie rods were rattling at 115k. All $300 worth of them. All 4 ball joints are new too.

 

They can bash all they want, Ive put a combined 300k on two diferent 3500 CTDs and have yet to spend a dime on my frontends. You can tell them to come look at my tires that I took off with 70k on them, and they will change their tune. And believe me I work the dog crap towing with my trucks. Maybe their just pissed cause we have the better engine. The guys on bottom always holler the loudest Until I bought a Dodge I stayed at the tire and front end shops.

 

Well I don't know about the 3rd gen , but I had 2 2nd gen trucks one gas
one diesel and both held up pretty good.
Sure I changed a couple of ball joints here and there, but nothing horrible.
The thing I had trouble with is the brakes pads and rotors.
Must be my driving.

 

I have replaced all the ball joints and front hubs once. I'm on my 3rd trac bar and 4th steering gear box. I put the stabilizing bracket on made by PSC Motorsports and that solved 99% of the problems I was having with the steering.

 

2004 QC 2500 4x4 CTD here and at 57K miles the front end is so sloppy it isn't funny. I don't haul a lot and haven't beat it off road. 99.99% highway driving. There's a lot of play in the steering box and I was going to see if I can adjust it, but I'd have to remove a lot of the front end to do it (any adjustments appear to be on top of the box, right under the bottom side of the engine...i.e. a pain to get to). I'm not real impressed with the front end on this thing.

When I can afford it, I'm going to replace the steering box and puta Thuren cross-over steering setup and trac-bar on it.