We also made another change to our front end and finally made the jump to Dynatrac Heavy Duty Ball Joints. We have been running Teraflex ball joints for several years now. We had originally put them in as Teraflex had a good reputation and the ball joints seemed to have received good reviews, and for just over $260 seemed like a good value.
The ball joints are supposedly adjustable, or at least you can adjust the pre-load on the ball joints when they loosen up. This happened shortly after I had put on the first set. When I put on new tires the shop told me that the ball joints were bad. When I called Teraflex that is when they told me that I just needed to adjust the pre-load. You need a special tool to adjust them but it is relatively easy. You just need to loosen the three Allen headset screws and then adjust the pre-load to 15-inch pounds of torque.
Just before we left on our trip it happened again, so instead of just tightening them I decided to buy another set and just have them replaced. Sure enough about three months into our trip when I was having work done the shop told me that the ball joints were bad again. I had to buy another tool as my old one was with my tools packed back in storage. Once the tool arrived, I tried multiple times to adjust the pre-load but it just wouldn't tighten.
By this time, my two front tires were wearing extremely unevenly and eventually got to the point where the whole front of the vehicle would shake. So I bought another full set of Milestar Patagonia's and found a local shop that installed the Dyanatrac Ball Joints for me. The shop had nothing but good things to say about them. If you can afford them and really offroad your rig they highly recommend them. They are also fully rebuildable in the shop while still installed so they are likely the last ball joints that you will ever buy. With that said, the shop told me that they have yet had to have to rebuild a set.
I had already thought highly of them but the shop's intel further reinforced my impressions. This was a great example of buy once cry once, and wish I had gone this route the first time. Two sets of ball joints, installation, a full set of tires, and countless alignments have made this a costly decision. But it wasn't like I bought some cheap Chinese knock-off, Teraflex has a solid reputation and I have had success with some of their other products.
The shop that installed the Dynatracs, and another shop that I called, both told me that they don't sell Teraflex Ball Joints anymore as they have had too many problems. I wish I had known that up front.
So be it, I have made the switch and couldn't be happier so far.
