Time for an Alignment or something worse? (LBJ's?)

Update

Okay so I go to school around Philadelphia, the roads are shit, lots of pot holes, etc. I am almost all stock. I usually drive highway to go to and from Maryland. During the summer I worked in Baltimore and commuted daily. I dont really go offroading too much unless I have to do it for work.

So I went under the truck not too long ago, didnt jack it up yet because its hard to find parking and i am on a slope parked, but I found that my tires are inflated to the right pressure. and I found that there is no grease leaking from the joints. I did find that there was a fine black powder around the area of the joints.


Tire wear drivers


Tire wear Passengers


LBJ Drivers, notice the black substance, It does not look like grease because it is grainy




Underside of the joint drivers



The passenger side


Seals look good



The grainy black substance, is that grease?





I wiped so off and it did not feel like grease at all, heres a picture




From what I have seen leak wise on tacomaworld, I dont have a leak. The black substance looks like just grime. I could be wrong. Let me know what you guys think.

 

Rubber particles mixed with grease from the boot on the BJ maybe? I'd change them when I could, go mid price. No need to go hog wild. See if you can borrow a pitman puller and you will be G2G in no time flat. Think about bringing a six pack of adult beverages to a local garage and ask the guys there to give you a hand as in borrow a tool or two and look over your shoulder.

 

If your going to change them go OEM only. Don't risk your LBJs with something other than the best.

 

Hey everyone, thanks for the help! I really appreciate it! So what I have decided to do is check the ball joints myself following the video 97TacoNM posted this week, if all checks out I will get an alignment, and if they are crap I will look to replace them when I head back home for college fall break. Thanks again guys!

 

Good news!!

So I checked the ball joints and they were good! I got the truck used, and I went on Toyotas website and found that the ball joints were recalled in 2005 and the original owner had them replaced!

 

That's good. They may have sprayed some kind of anti-rust on them = what may be the odd black particle looking stuff. Judging by how rusted the castle nut looks they may have opted to do that.

 

One way to check is to jack up the front a little to take some weight off the first side to be checked get a bar to pry up some where I put a little arrow (between the LCA & the bolt(s) that hold the lower ball joint to spindle) pry up & if theres any movement , pretty much at all, the LBJ need replacing, should be zero amount of vertical movement..

& looks like you've been leaking some grease..

 

My friend and I tried to move the wheel, and see if we could get any movement from the joint and it did not move, we gave a considerable amount of force to it. I am going on break for college for a couple of days and I will get it checked out.

The original joints were recalled by toyota and the previous owner had them replaced in 2005, at 35000 miles. I am about 100000 miles past that, but I dont know if they would wear out that quick?

 

100k on lower ball joints - not a bad time to consider replacing them. I just replaced the drive axles (CV axles) on my Camry, and they use the exact same type lower ball joint assembly. I had to separate the assembly from the lower control arm and it was not a big deal at all. I did not unseat the LBJ assembly from the knuckle, so that will take a little more effort, but all in all pretty easy.

You are probably OK for a bit, but you never know. If you start hearing bad clicking and popping - change them out.

 

Yeah no clicking yet. Money is just tight right now and being at school its hard to do anything with the amount of crap I have to do.

 

I'm no expert or a pro mechanic, so only my 2 cents, but I would think you are fine. Plan on it someday in the not too distant future. Before I plan on going out for any serious offroading I plan on doing mine - my Taco is at 127k and I have no clicking or grease seepage at all, but why not. I can keep the old ones as spares.