1973 F100 2 wheel drive. It creaks and shudders a bit when turning at low speeds. Does this sound like ball joints?

 

It could be ball joints if ya had ball joints - ya gots kingpins mate.

To troubleshoot, do a complete lube job on the steering components and kingpins and then see if the groaning goes away. Check the tightness of the lugnuts while you're at it.

After that test drive, jack up each front wheel and test for play by rocking the wheel/tire along a horizontal axis by pushing and pulling the top and bottom of the tire. If it has play, then new kingpins are in your near future.

 

Yeah, that's funny. That would explain why I could only find ball joints for the 4 wheel drive version.

 

Check your front cab mounts too. When they start to collapse the steering gets funky and noisy.