Highly recommended

 

For starters I had a MOOG ball joint that didn't even have 30K miles on it pop out when I hit a dip in the highway. Luckily I didn't roll over but it ripped 3 of the 3 a-arm mounts off and cracked the frame.

Several guys I wheel with have had Moog ball joints and tie rod ends with low miles on them pop out on on the trails.

You can defend Moog all you want but after what I've seen and considering a failure can cost you serious injury or death I'll spend the money on the OEM Toyota ball joints.


FOG

 

Well, someone who knows how to stress test a ball joint with a ball joint separator pry bar.

 

And if I would've done that... no problems right? Because the amount of "stress" from a pry bar would've sheared this thing eh? Man... I've read some of your other posts as well... it makes me kind of sad for you.

I'm going with OEM on the ball joints for sure.

 

Sprocket I had to take a second look at your pictures. When I looked at them last night (half asleep) I thought the ball joint popped out of the socket. But now I see it sheared off!

Sadly the type of failure you had with the ball shearing off of the stud isn't something that can be found even by the most competent mechanic. The only way to predict that type of failure would be to have the ball joint magnafluxed.

DailyDrive...You could have gone at that ball joint with a 10ft long pry bar and never have been able to detect the type of failure sprocket experienced. All the pry bar method does it detect slow in the ball and socket, not metal fatigue in the stud.

I've seen allot of ball joint failures but never one just shear off like that.


FOG

 

Some states don't require state inspections since we don't salt our roads and ruin vehicles.

I hate the fact that Washington weather this year is a rainy sucky mess, but I won't EVER live in a state that salts their roads.

Also, banging on it with a ball joint separator won't do anything. You can't replicate 3500+ lbs vehicle weight and vibration simply by hitting a separator with a hammer.

 

My mother just spent $600 at a shop to replace her CV's and Ball joints in the front. I thought it was a BS expense until I just saw this post. Glad everyone is alright

 

I replaced mine last month; $175 in OEM parts from toyotapartsales.com . At 155k I thought I was pushing my luck..

 

Just replaced mine with some from Napa... now you guys got me scared... I didn't wanna dish out the extra $$ for OEM.

 

There's a reason Toyota parts cost more; they cost more to make - you get what you pay for.

You can't go wrong with OEM parts IMHO.

Sprock:
Sorry to hear about this man. I'm glad it wasn't any worse, and that you got to walk away!



That's not going to test for shear failure. Here's a little mechanical engineering for you, courtesy of a book entitled: "Materials Science for Engineers", and my Fracture Mechanics book.

The only way that he could have known his ball joint was about to shear was to have it x-rayed and look at the crystalline structure of the steel for stress cracks. Obviously some serious x-ray equipment is required to do such a thing so its totally impractical to do so. Considering that cracks in steel, and I'm neglecting to consider finishing or grade of the steel here (finishing referring to tempering, annealing, other treating) propagate at a roughly mile per second, well you're not going to know its going to fail until it goes SNAP!

Sure the ball joint probably deflected and plastically deformed before it sheared, but who is going to actually mike their ball joints expecting to find stress elongation, or any other sort of plastic deformation indicating impending failure.

We all expect our ball joints to hold on, and as a wear part to replace them when they ware out. I've got 150K on mine and they all feel as tight as the uniballs Chaos sends you in a LT kit.

Shearing a ball joint like that is just scary, and my first thought definitely ran to defective steel, or bad metallurgy. I would definitely let Toyota know about that one, and make sure to reference the recall.

Its not confidence inspiring at all to know that a ball joint just sheared like that.

Again, I'm glad you're okay and sorry you have to deal with this mess.

 

my thoughts exactly...beat me to it

 

Hmm. . . My 2wd Runner is about to hit 170k and I'm fairly certain the ball joints are original. My front end has not felt as solid as I am used to, do you guys recommend changing the ball joints? I was already planning to replace the bushings, but if it could have a catastrophic failure like this I'd want to do that much sooner! I was just thinking that since it's only a 4x2 and I've hardly ever gone off road, the joints may not have been subject to the same kind of stress.

 

Wow, that's a very interesting failure. Never seen that happen before on a Toyota truck. I'd like to see a closer view of the shear surface. From a distance the surface looks smooth to about 2/3rds of the way through the fracture surface then rough for the remaining 1/3rd. Closer inspection might reveal signs of fatigue cracking.

 

I def agree on the quality of moog headin down the crapper...however.... they do have lifetime warrant, so...I continue to buy them, and being as it only takes me about an hour or 2 to change all 4...I just replace them free when then need it...

Btw... to the op.... looks like you got outta this one fairly cheap...I have seen the control arms get mangled from failed balljoints, as well as major body dmage, or even rollovers....

did it make ur bumhole pucker when it happened? lol

 

Yea but a lifetime warranty won't fix your truck, tow you off a trail, or worse give you back your life if they fail at highway speeds.

Its kinda like a lifetime warranty on a oil pump. Its not the price of the replacement part, its the price of the labor and possible damages as a result of its failure which are not covered by that life time warranty.


FOG

 

Can we get a closeup?

 

To the OP. Do not blame Toyota for your lack of maintenance. You need to find a new mechanic!

James

 

James: My mother's 4runner has 330,000+ miles on it and just now replaced the ball joints. It is plain dumb to blame the OP for something like this at so few miles. Toyota makes durable parts so something like a complete shearing failure of that part is so unlikely. Save your flames for the fireplace.

 

damn, I am definitely looking into ball joints now. The few times I've had my truck inspected, no one has ever mentioned them... just the tie rods, but it may be time to rebuild everything... at 173k

 

Yes... I clearly don't see how any mechanic or inspection could've seen this, and I'm not sure I ever blamed Toyota.

Daily, I'll try to get some more pictures on here soon.