2nd gen Tacoma upper ball joint

Noticed my upper ball joint boot was ripped while checking out the brakes. Is this a must fix now? Also can I replace just the boot or do I need to do the entire upper ball joint?

 

You can just replace the boot if the joint is still in good shape. I recently changed my upper ball joints (original) out for some Mevotech joints. A good part but the boot was absolute garbage. I ended up replacing the boots with red urethane boots. They worked nicely.

 

How do you tell if the joint is still good and just needs a new boot?

 

Most guys just use a pry bar and see if they get any movement between the upper arm that the ball joint is mounted in, and the spindle that the ball joint goes through. Mine were bad enough that I could just grab the upper arm and wiggle it and see the movement.

 

Looks to me like there isn’t any play in my ball joints, and they just need new boots. Do you have a link for the boots you bought?

 

They were Prothane 19-1715. It's actually a set for a 64-72 Chevelle. There are 4 in the set, but youll only need 2 of them. I'm going to assume they will work for an OEM joint, but that may not be the case. As stated, I used them on a Mevotech joint.