Ball joints question

[Tedster]

So i noticed both my ball joints area cracked and leaking on the front. What the heck. So if i dont replace them, is that bad? What do they do anyways? Ughh i just had my front struts replaced and that cost a pretty penny.
Thanks...

 

[mechead11]

is your car making alot of noise/ rattling/ clunking? if not I wouldnt really worry too much about it. and if its a 3rd gen you prolly cant replace the ball joints alone. you'd need to replace the entire lower control arm. you can get a set of them for less than $150 on ebay. and its only like 3 bolts to replace them.

 

[slavrenz]

is your car making alot of noise/ rattling/ clunking? if not I wouldnt really worry too much about it. and if its a 3rd gen you prolly cant replace the ball joints alone. you'd need to replace the entire lower control arm. you can get a set of them for less than $150 on ebay. and its only like 3 bolts to replace them.

The ball joints, which are pressed into the control arms (those black triangles underneath your struts) allow the wheel assembly to pivot around with regards to the suspension system, while giving support so your struts and wheels stay underneath your car. If you leave bad ball joints unfixed, they could eventually rust and fail, which will cause your wheel to do sort of a cock-eyed thing in your wheel well and render your car undriveable. Believe me, I had this happen twice on an old Chevy S-10 while driving on the highway. Not fun.

If the ball joint boot is broken, the entire control arm assembly (both sides) will need to be replaced - don't let a garage tell you that they can press in new ball joints, because it'll compromise the integrity of the control arm.

Personally, I wouldn't go with the eBay control arms - you have no way to verify their quality. If you look on RockAuto.com, you can get both control arms for about $150 as well, made by Beck-Arnley, who is a reputable maker of OEM parts. Replacing the is pretty straightforward, but you have to be sure to bolt them on with a certain sequence, as some of the mounting points have to be prestressed, or you'll never get things to line up.