Well i an getting ready to do my annual road trip from maine to kansas. I just went to get my truck inspected and was told i need upper and lower ball joints, definitely the uppers and do the lowers because they will need replacing soon. I have an 06 f250 lariat crew cab with the 5.4. I just had my truck for tire rotation and oil chAnge at the dealership and they did not mention any problems with ball joints a few weeks ago. I don't feel any looseness in the truck. My plan is to address the problem when i get back, about 3900 miles from now, when i will be getting new tires as well. The question is would anyone be hesitant about the long trip with ball joints that supposedly needing replaced?

 

JMO, and mind you front-end work is not my forte. I looked at your profile and see you have only 24,000 or less miles on your truck? Unless it's 4WD and ridden real hard, I'd be very surprised if you'd need ball joints already. Who's telling you it needs it? The dealer? Isn't it covered under warranty?

 

I should have mentioned that i have 58k miles. A service station is saying i need the ball joints, i asked for an estimate and he gave me an estimate of $610, which i thought was reasonable. I had taken my truck to my regular garage over the summer and they looked at the ball joints and found them to be fine at that time.

 

Its possible but keep in mind that you should always get second opinion from a trusted source. Case in point....A coworker of mine owns a truck like yours f250 extended cab gasoiline and was told at the tire store that he could not get an alignment when he bought tires b/c of needing all 4 ball joints. The tire store was owned by a friend of his father and they offered to do the job for around $1100.

I already thought the tire price was high and was suspect of the need for all 4 but anything is possible with it bopping around the farm and stuff. Anyway, he purchased the joints that he wanted. I have a friend that runs an alignment shop in town and pretty much only does alignments and brakes and has been in business for 20 years. We took it to him and he called wondering why it needed ball joints. All i could say was that the other place said it needed them. HE said no movement at all and even put it on the rack to show when we picked it up. I looked at the boy who owned the shop and asked him did he ever check it himself and he said no. Not only did the truck drive like cadillac (according to him) but the shop who only did the alignment purchased the joints from my coworker for the price paid at the parts store.