I have a 2003 Ram Van 1500. When I first got it, the steering was pretty loose, so I adjusted the steering box and that helped some. Then I put a couple of tack weld on the steering shaft at the slip joint. That helped a little more, but it was still wandering. So after checking stuff out I decided it was a bad idler arm on the passenger side. I went to Parts Geek and found a cheap replacement, and bought 2. Figured I'd do both sides. I changed them out and there was minimal improvement. That was about 2 months ago.

Over this last week whilst doing a lot of dirt road driving, the passenger side of the front suspension developed a new clunk. With the wheels on the ground everything under there was tight with no slop anywhere.I wiggled things around, and found one of the arms that connects one of the tie rod ends to linkage was loose, so I tightened it Then I raised the passenger side and found this:
I lifted the other side and it looks even worse with both side off the ground. It seems like this is because of the difference in the size of the mounting bolt and the bushing sleeve through hole. There's about .030 of slop and also up down movement. It looks like the idler arms I took off were not factory, and also have the slop issue. They seem to be a better quality part than the ones I replaced them with, so I put them back on. It helped get rid of about 50% of that movement, but it's still got plenty.

I think the mounting bolts that mount the frame to the idler arm are the original factory parts. The holes in the frame where they go are a very close fit, and I'm thinking the factory idler arms must also have a close fit between the bolt and the bushing sleeve. That would sure cut down on all the movement.

Aside from wandering, and clunking in dirt, there's no abnormal tire wear or wobbles.

 

Wow Bob! Holy moly, That shake reminds me of the ole washing machine!
Hope you're getting things back to dialed in right!

 

Isn't that crazy? and it drives fine, aside from some wandering and a clunk. Putting the idler arms that were on the van back on helped, but I think I will need to get factory parts with closer tolerances.
It seems like the play is all because of the slop between the sleeve and the mounting bolt of the idler arm.
I do a lot of dirt road driving, so will need to get this figured out. I disassembled one of the idler arms from Parts Geek. When I get a chance I'm going to machine a new sleeve (black part,red arrow) with a hole that fits the mounting bolt better.
The way the idler arms are made it's obvious they should be a pretty rigid fit. It's amazing how .030 slop it the mounting point can translate to an inch of slop in the linkage.

 

Here's what I ended up doing.


Piece of oil impregnated brass bushing material, above original part.

Polishing mounting bolt where it makes contact with bushing.

Added zerk!

Aluminum cover press fitted.


Here's the result. Still a bit or play when I wiggle the tire. I haven't tried to trace down the cause. But you can see much improvement. It improved handling by about 100%, and no more clunking.

 

I have the same issue with my van and I'm going to do the same thing. I bought a new idler less than a year ago and it's bad. I replaced it with the same part with little improvement. The drivers side is factory original with 134000 miles and it has less movement that the new replacement. So I'm going to machine the new one and install it and then do the same to the other one and keep it on hand until the factory one is ready.
Great job on the mod!

 

Thanks for the compliment and posting.

So far this seems to be working out good. I think any remaining slop is being caused by the idler arms, still. It's way better than before, but when I made the bushings I made them the same length as the defective ones. There are 2 spacing washers, for each idler arm. One on top and one on the bottom. They are a bit too thin to keep the idler arm from moving up and down on the mounting bolt. Not much, but it doesn't take much slop at the attaching point to turn into a lot on the other end.

When you make yours, try to get a no up/own movement fit. I'll probably end up making thicker washers at some point.