The Ultimate Ball Joint Comparison!!!

[CO2Wrangler]

Yeah Northridge doesn't discount them but go direct to MC and you can find sales on em when you would expect to find sales.

Kind of like I said in my last post.

And like I said, that's stuffs all excluded, regardless of what time of year it is. Otherwise they'd be on my Jeep right now:

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[GMONEY]

And like I said, that's stuffs all excluded, regardless of what time of year it is. Otherwise they'd be on my Jeep right now:

Oh man they must have changed that recently (maybe when they went black) cuz I know they were included in the past.

My bad

 

[CO2Wrangler]

Oh man they must have changed that recently (maybe when they went black) cuz I know they were included in the past.

My bad

No worries. It bummed me out. I got all excited and then had to rethink the order of my upgrades

 

[GMONEY]

No worries. It bummed me out. I got all excited and then had to rethink the order of my upgrades

Haha

I feel ya there. Hopefully my stock ones last long enough for the ballers to be on sale.

 

[3TV]

Great video. It would be interesting to see the cost of the OEM ones as well.

I take all claims of increased durability over OEM with a grain of salt. OEMs track durability of their parts closely, specially since this is a drivetrain component under 5year 60K miles warranty.

I have 33K miles on OEM joints running 37s and frequent wheeling, with no looseness. Similarly had 55K miles on my JK's original joints won 35s, no issues.

Seems to me that an aftermarket joint would need to exceed that factory 60K miles before a rebuilding is even in the cards. That would make it a 120K mile Jeep.

I'm more concerned about my aluminum knuckles than my ball joints.

Think what you want. The OEM ball joints on my 392 were loose enough to negatively affect handling with just 12,000 miles use, with frequent off-roading on 37s. Changing to Dynatrac ball joints made a marked improvement in drivability and completely eliminated any loose floaty feeling and the frequent need for steering corrections that Jeeps are known for. I'm willing to bet that you don't even know what a heavy-duty set of ball joints even feels like compared to OEM.

 

[3TV]

We are now Metal Cloak distributors! Whoo-hoo!

Whoo hoo is right. Bout dam time.

 

[Apples491]

The install went super easy, except for having to wail on the aluminum knuckle to get it to drop. That's more than I can say for the Dynatrac install we did on my friends jeep immediately after mine was done. The Dynatracs just did not want to play nice with the ball joint press I rented from Autozone. But we got those done too.

I only have about 25 yards on them so far so I'll have to report back on how they change the ride. My stock joints did not feel bad after removal but I was definitely getting symptoms that they weren't happy. Maybe they were just really not up to the task on the 130lbs per corner I'm rolling around on.

 

[gato]

Think what you want. The OEM ball joints on my 392 were loose enough to negatively affect handling with just 12,000 miles use, with frequent off-roading on 37s. Changing to Dynatrac ball joints made a marked improvement in drivability and completely eliminated any loose floaty feeling and the frequent need for steering corrections that Jeeps are known for. I'm willing to bet that you don't even know what a heavy-duty set of ball joints even feels like compared to OEM.

I don't have an opinion. I simply asked for information/data on the longevity of these rebuildable ball joints vs OEM.

Given how generally inexpensive ball joints are, the critical role they play, the vast amounts of money Jeep has spent creating 6 different steering stabilizer version, replacing steering boxes, paying an endless number of warranty claims on death wabble, wandering, etc, I think Jeep is must be fielding what they thing is a very good design. They didn't even need to create a new balljoint version for the much heavier 392 and diesel or the XR package.

So, the question remains, is there any data on longevity?

As far as the feeling you got when you upgraded the your ball joints from warn to new, you might have gotten the same feeling regardless of what the new balljoint was. I have seen this multiple times. People upgrade from worn tires to new tires brand A and come to the conclusion that brand A is amazing and the best thing ever, simply because they are moving from totally worn tires to new tires.

 

[wibornz]

So longevity of the Dynatrac rebuildable ball joints. My Jeep has had the Dynatrac ball joints for about 100,000 very hard miles. I am talking thousand and thousand of off road miles. They have performed so well that when I ordered my new front axle, I had them put the Dynatrac ball joint in the HD60.

So I have installed them into four JLUR that wheel with us often. All of the JLURs have close to 100,000 miles with no issues. I did rebuild them one time. I was experiencing death wobble and thought that it maybe the ball joints. It was not the ball joints. The rebuild kit was $149 if I remember right. What but there is more expense than that. You have to re-glue the rubber boot back to the ball joint. It requires the use of Loctite 380. I could not find it local and had to order it off Amazon. It is not cheap! I knew the ball joints were still good as soon as I pulled the first knuckle but was like fuck it, I am this far into it, I might as well freshen them up. The rebuild was easy and straight forward.

When I say hard miles, I am not exaggerating. I am in the waiting for the front 60 axle to be delivered now because the Dana 44 is bent like this.

Passenger side looks good.

The drivers side not so good. It is a few inches from being level. The front wheel is leaning way in.

Yikes,

 

[DanW]

I don't have an opinion. I simply asked for information/data on the longevity of these rebuildable ball joints vs OEM.

Given how generally inexpensive ball joints are, the critical role they play, the vast amounts of money Jeep has spent creating 6 different steering stabilizer version, replacing steering boxes, paying an endless number of warranty claims on death wabble, wandering, etc, I think Jeep is must be fielding what they thing is a very good design. They didn't even need to create a new balljoint version for the much heavier 392 and diesel or the XR package.

So, the question remains, is there any data on longevity?

As far as the feeling you got when you upgraded the your ball joints from warn to new, you might have gotten the same feeling regardless of what the new balljoint was. I have seen this multiple times. People upgrade from worn tires to new tires brand A and come to the conclusion that brand A is amazing and the best thing ever, simply because they are moving from totally worn tires to new tires.

I think they can be like any other part....someone could get one or a set that are slightly out of spec due to QC at the supplier and they could wear quickly. I feel, and yes, the word feel covers it with something like this....that on my JL they are doing fine at 103k miles because I have a Gladiator I bought with only 35k miles on it, including almost no off-roading (I did a trip to WV with some mild wheeling) and they both feel the same.

I would say if someone is wondering if they are worn, drive another same/similar Jeep and see how it feels and tracks.

I will probably replace them soon as my JL will be heading to Moab for the 4th time in it´s life. That´s probably the 8th major wheeling trip on it. So really, it is impressive that the OEM´s have lasted that long. They may go quite a bit longer on my JT, since it has not been wheeled like the JL. But that is soon to change! It´s going to Moab, too.

I´m going to finish watching this video. What I really want is a set of joints with zerk fittings on them so they can be greased. The ones on my JK had that. WIth greasable joints, there should never be a need to rebuild them.

 

[DanW]

So longevity of the Dynatrac rebuildable ball joints. My Jeep has had the Dynatrac ball joints for about 100,000 very hard miles. I am talking thousand and thousand of off road miles. They have performed so well that when I ordered my new front axle, I had them put the Dynatrac ball joint in the HD60.

So I have installed them into four JLUR that wheel with us often. All of the JLURs have close to 100,000 miles with no issues. I did rebuild them one time. I was experiencing death wobble and thought that it maybe the ball joints. It was not the ball joints. The rebuild kit was $149 if I remember right. What but there is more expense than that. You have to re-glue the rubber boot back to the ball joint. It requires the use of Loctite 380. I could not find it local and had to order it off Amazon. It is not cheap! I knew the ball joints were still good as soon as I pulled the first knuckle but was like fuck it, I am this far into it, I might as well freshen them up. The rebuild was easy and straight forward.

Your experience is a big point for Dynatrac. I know you´ve put them through hell and back.

 

[wibornz]

I think they can be like any other part....someone could get one or a set that are slightly out of spec due to QC at the supplier and they could wear quickly. I feel, and yes, the word feel covers it with something like this....that on my JL they are doing fine at 103k miles because I have a Gladiator I bought with only 35k miles on it, including almost no off-roading (I did a trip to WV with some mild wheeling) and they both feel the same.

I would say if someone is wondering if they are worn, drive another same/similar Jeep and see how it feels and tracks.

I will probably replace them soon as my JL will be heading to Moab for the 4th time in it´s life. That´s probably the 8th major wheeling trip on it. So really, it is impressive that the OEM´s have lasted that long. They may go quite a bit longer on my JT, since it has not been wheeled like the JL. But that is soon to change! It´s going to Moab, too.

I´m going to finish watching this video. What I really want is a set of joints with zerk fittings on them so they can be greased. The ones on my JK had that. WIth greasable joints, there should never be a need to rebuild them.

The Dynatrac ones are greasable too.

 

[DanW]

The Dynatrac ones are greasable too.

Yep, that´s great! I really like those. Just watched the video. Very informative!

The rebuild process looks pretty straight forward. Did you find it pretty easy to do?

 

[ASSFROW]

I’m surprised they didn’t show the price of the rebuild kits. That would help for making an informed decision on which ball joints to buy. Yes, I realize that sounds lazy, as we can look them up ourselves, but isn’t that the point of the video?

Actually you can't, at least for MetalCloak. I saw the video before this thread was started and was also curious. MetalCloak doesn't list the upper rebuild kits on their site and the lower rebuild kit is $179. I asked about rebuild kits on the video and Northridge said they'd get back to me. Based on the price of the lowers and MetalCloak stuff being expensive anyway, my guess is the upper rebuild kit will be in the $300 range, so being rebuildable at those prices makes it much less attractive. Being adjustable helps. If they last twice as long as Dynatracs and that's a HUGE IF, I still don't know if it's worth it. You can buy a set of Dynatrac ball joints and a rebuild kit for the same price as just the MeatalCloak ball joints.

 

[DanW]

Actually you can't, at least for MetalCloak. I saw the video before this thread was started and was also curious. MetalCloak doesn't list the upper rebuild kits on their site and the lower rebuild kit is $179. I asked about rebuild kits on the video and Northridge said they'd get back to me. Based on the price of the lowers and MetalCloak stuff being expensive anyway, my guess is the upper rebuild kit will be in the $300 range, so being rebuildable at those prices makes it much less attractive. Being adjustable helps. If they last twice as long as Dynatracs and that's a HUGE IF, I still don't know if it's worth it. You can buy a set of Dynatrac ball joints and a rebuild kit for the same price as just the MeatalCloak ball joints.

Yeah, the price of the Metalcloaks also makes me wonder why they have only a 1 year warranty. That puts them in the NOPE category, for me. I just don´t get that with all the great materials and over the top construction they are using. The cheapest ones have a lifetime warranty, so that´s like a free rebuild kit.

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