Ball joint lubrication

[JDgreen227]

This may not be applicable to some tractors, but my JD manual illustrates where you are to grease the "left and right steering cylinder ball joints"...on the MFWD models.

Last night I was reading the newest issue of an RV magazine, and in one of the tech columns there was a letter from someone who owned a 1990 motorhome with 29,000 miles.
He was asking why a low-mileage chassis would need to have the front ball joints replaced, and the tech advisor told him it was likely the ball joints had never been properly greased.
The advisor said that suspension ball joints should be greased when the vehicle is on a lift and the wheels are hanging so grease will flow into the socket, and if the vehicle weight is on the wheels while greasing the ball joints no grease will be flow into the socket where it is needed, so premature replacement will be required.

Now, I have been changing the oil and greasing the suspension of my vehicles for the past 25 years when the front end was elevated on ramps, or in the case of my 4wd GMC, when it it sitting on level ground. The furthest one of them has been driven is a 130,000 mile Olds 98, and the ball joints are still tight. I am wondering if greasing them while the wheels are hanging is all that critical to long life. The drive-thru oil change places such as Jiffy Lube do lubrications while the vehicles are on the ground.

I would be interested in hearing comments as to what the proper methods actually are. Thanks.

 

[Bird]

I think what you read was right as far as the "preferable" or "best" way to grease ball joints, but of course, sometimes "good enough" has to do instead of "best". /forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif

 

[GerardC]

Doesn't the old grease usually squeeze out when the new is injected? I would think that the new grease has flowed through the socket completely, but maybe not? /forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif Gerard

 

[Soundguy]

My 1946 ford 2n, 1952 ford 8n, 1954 ford NAA, and 1966 IH cub are all on oem ball joints. There is less play than the thinnest feeler gauge on my set.. and that one is flexible by hand. Two of them still had the reminants of the original leather dust boots on them. One had a broken off grease fitting inthe top of the draglink.. so it obviously hadn't been greased in recent history... probably not in decades.

While tractors don't see the 'miles' of driving a vehicle does.. I believe they see the worst of environments that passanger vehicles do not.

There's usually always a good healthy coating of sand and grime on most of my tractor after it has been in the pasture all day.

That said.. the steering members on an RV sound like they get quite a bit of stress.. Id wager it was just plain 'lack of lubrication' as in.. the owner bought it and never greased it.. then complained that it failed, rather than it was greased inefectively. Just a hunch.. but seems fairly possible.

Soundguy

 

[Bird]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( steering members on an RV sound like they get quite a bit of stress )</font>

Yes, they do, but as with any other vehicle, it depends to some extent on the terrain being traversed, quality of the original parts, etc. My '73 Winnebago, on a Dodge chassis, had to have new king pins and bushings before it had 20,000 miles on it and then no more problem after that. It was out of warranty and I wrote letters both to Chrysler Corp. and to Winnebago. Chrysler paid half; Winnebago never even answered my letter. And the '89 Chevy one ton trucks had a "recall" of sorts for dealers to replace the ball joints if a customer had any steering problem. I had mine replaced under warranty.

And while replacing steering and front suspension components seemed relatively rare in Dallas, I found that my brother's garage in Anchorage did a booming business replacing those components on all kinds of vehicles, including quite a number that were still in warranty.

 

[Dargo]

Bird, you mentioned ball joints on a Dodge, and it reminded me of my sister. She bought a new Durango when they first came out. Well, she always takes here vehicle to a "local" tire shop for her lube, oil, filters, etc. Anyway, they did the 'ole prybar on the wheel deal with her and convinced her that she had bad ball joints. She kept taking it in the the Dodge dealer who kept saying it was fine. She believed her local garage and went ahead and had them put on some "super duty" ball joints for her. Her turning radius went up by about 100 feet! /forums/images/graemlins/shocked.gif

I did some looking into it for her and found that on almost all new vehicles now there is a slight amount of play in the ball joint to allow a tighter turning radius. After my sister drove it for a while and could never park it, she finally paid the dealer to put OEM ball joints back on it. That was 102k miles ago. They are still slightly loose, but otherwise fine.

One older service manager at a dealership I spoke with told me that several years ago cars had much tighter ball joints on them to start, and any play was considered not acceptable. They didn't have as tight of a turning radius as the same sized car now would have. Have you heard that before? He told me that is where the independent shops used to jack up a car and try to see if they could use a prybar to show a customer where their ball joints were "loose", and therefore unsafe.

 

[Bird]

Brent, when you talk about how much play is acceptable in any of the front end parts, I think you'll get a lot of disagreement. A few years ago when I bought an old '81 F250 to use on the farm, I bought new tires for it and took it to a shop that does nothing but front end alignments. I've forgotten what to call the arms on each side that go from the I-beam axle back to the frame and have big rubber bushings on the end at the frame, but the alignment guy said he wouldn't do an alignment until I had those bushings replaced. So I took it to an independent garage where I knew the owner. He said he saw nothing wrong with those bushings and I inspected it with him and agreed. However, I had him replace them and went back and got the front end alignment done. Now the alignment guy had nothing to gain by telling me to replace them, since his shop didn't do that kind of work; the mechanic had nothing to gain by telling me they didn't need replacing (in fact he'd have lost money by not doing the job) and I knew both of these guys well enough to think they're both honest businessmen, but it was simply a case of an honest difference of opinion.

The summer I worked in my brother's garage in Anchorage, we did what I considered to be an amazing amount of business with front end work. We had one of the latest and best front end alignment machines available and it stayed busy all day every day, partly because we ran coupons in the newspaper advertising cheaper alignments with the coupon. And yes, we did some of the "ole pry bar on the wheel" deal to show some customers what had too much play. And then we told the customers what it would cost to fix it if we did it, but we also always told the customer that we'd be glad to do the alignment (at the coupon price) if the customer wanted to do the job himself or take it elsewhere to have the parts replaced first. We did have just a few, not many, customers (primarily used car dealers) who wanted us to "just align it as close as you can as it is." And we refused to do that. We charged nothing for checking the alignment and showing the customer what was needed, but if we couldn't do the job right, and guarantee it, we wouldn't do it at all.

Well, I've made this too long, but back to your original comments . . . I don't recall ever hearing of new ball joints increasing the turning radius so I don't know what happened there, and I don't know anything about any "super duty" ball joints.

 

[jeffmazz]

JDGREEN227,

Ball joints do not need to be unloaded (no weight on front suspension) in order to be properly greased. The ball in the joint has grooves machined in it so grease can flow from the fitting around the ball and into the grease cup. The grooves also aid in dispersing the grease when the joint moves.

Jeff

 

[Bird]

A good reminder, Jeff. Thanks. To tell the truth, I'd forgotten that some have those grooves. Do all of them have the grooves now?

 

[JDgreen227]

Thanks for the information on the grooves, I was hoping some qualified member on TBN could advise us. My knowledge of ball joint construction is somewhat limited, the last one I replaced was on a 3 year old '67 Mustang.