Re: [DML] Ball joints

["Tom Niemczewski" <tomciodmc@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hello

I feel that I need to tell you about my experience with the lower ball 
joint. It failed on my car without warning and it was only about 5000 miles 
old. When I bought my car I replaced all the safety related parts just to 
make sure the car is in fact safe. Lower and upper ball joints were among a 
bunch of other things that were replaced. I don't drive like a maniac so I 
didn't subject the part to any excessive forces. Nothing was loose and there 
was no warning that something might actually happen. One day on my way home 
while I was going down a narrow street at about 15 - 20 mph my right lower 
ball joint suddenly failed. The car dropped to the ground, lower control arm 
scraped some material off the rim and then landed on the ground. The only 
indication that I had was that on last two turns the steering was a bit 
stiffer that usual... that's it.
The joint just separated... as in the ball came out of the socket.
This was a bit scary for me because it turned out that a fairly new part can 
fail with almost no warning. Looking on the bright side, this is probably 
very unusual and will not happen again. At least I hope it will not happen 
again

Tom Niemczewski
vin 6149 (in Poland!)
Google earth:  52°25'17"N 21°1'59"E
tomciodmc@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
www.deloreana.com

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "John Hervey" <john@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <dmcnews@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Saturday, 04 March, 2006 4:27 AM
Subject: RE: [DML] Ball joints


> Ed,
> Most anything can give out, but it's not a problem without plenty of 
> notice
> first. The steering and front end would just be just very loose and unless
> you just ignore it, you would normally take it to a front end place to 
> check
> out.
> John Hervey
> www.specialtauto.com
>
>
>
>
[moderator snip]





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