my 99 4runner lost her lower ball joint today and popped the whole wheel off. I had no typical warning signs, she was driving smooth and straight before this happened. what a pita! check your ball joints!!!!!

 

You and all these guys. Thats sucks man.

https://www.yotatech.com/forums/f2/t...ilures-244804/

 

And these poor souls

https://www.yotatech.com/forums/f28/tundra-catastrophic-balljoint-failure-258350/

 

Bummer. Since they seem to give little to no advance warning before failing, replace them as PM, at say 10-12 years....the lower BJ and bolts are cheap to replace relative to the consequences.

Sandman, how many miles on them?

 

oof!

going to check mine first thing tomorrow to make sure they're still holding together. Used tons of blue loctite and torque wrench to spec but it is still on the back of my brain often times...

yikes!

 

You need to unload them before you can check them. Lift from directly underneath the joint. But if you have more than 100k miles, I would just replace them.

 

not sure what the mileage on the ball joint is - I got the truck in 2008 with about 125k miles on it - it's up to 190k now and I haven't touched them...

 

Sandman, how fast were you going? Looks like your fender is salvageable unlike some of those guys.

 

Thankfully I wasn't going fast...maybe 30 mph

 

Right in the mileage range where other original ones failed.....

Hope there is not much other damage under there. Definately change the left side now, lower and upper.

 

..another view...

 

Same thing happened to my buddy's taco. His ball joint was fine tho only 150kmiles, the bracket that actually holds the ball joint snapped.

 

Geez, kinda makes me glad to have a solid axle pickup, and early IFS Runner...

That would just suck to have this happen. Although I tend to maintain my trucks, and check for loose stuff that could kill me....

 

i guess I dropped the ball.....joint this time!