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Ball Joint Amazement

Posted: Mon Nov 20, 2017 9:39 am
by vwlover77
I replaced the passenger side ball joint boots this past weekend (fun! :flower: ). They were both torn, but the driver's side are just fine. Strange.

Anyway, I have a huge stack of repair receipts for the Bus across its entire 250,000+ mile history with no record of ball joint replacement.

I was shocked, and pleasantly surprised, to discover NO play whatsoever in either joint on the passenger side. I'm assuming the driver's side should be in similar condition.

Given all the horror stories about replacement joints, I'm very happy.

Did I just get lucky, were the joints replaced at some point, or is this typical?

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Re: Ball Joint Amazement

Posted: Mon Nov 20, 2017 11:57 am
by Bleyseng
Looks like someone install grease fittings so that sure helps! Fresh grease and keeping the dirt out with sealed boots will make em last and last.

Re: Ball Joint Amazement

Posted: Mon Nov 20, 2017 12:02 pm
by vwlover77
That someone was me, but it was done only a few years / miles ago - small percentage of the total.

Re: Ball Joint Amazement

Posted: Mon Nov 20, 2017 7:14 pm
by wcfvw69
When I replaced the original ball joints in my bus, I saw that they had a VW logo stamped on them at the top. Does your ball joints have the VW logo?

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Re: Ball Joint Amazement

Posted: Sat Apr 20, 2019 5:08 pm
by Amskeptic
wcfvw69 wrote:
Mon Nov 20, 2017 7:14 pm
When I replaced the original ball joints in my bus, I saw that they had a VW logo stamped on them at the top. Does your ball joints have the VW logo?


Not any more! I just bought four (4) ball joints for $47.00 off Ebay. Brand OE. The only after market brand that has a fully supported cup. FEBI and Meyle are dead to me. Ye olden days Lemforder are OK, but new Chinese ones, who knows yet? :

http://www.wagenswest.com/how_to/bus_va ... arison.php


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Re: Ball Joint Amazement

Posted: Mon May 06, 2019 6:44 pm
by Mr Blotto
The dumbest thing I did to my Westy soon after I bought it was to replace the upper and lower (drivers and passenger) original 89k mile ball joints with Meyles, JUST BASED ON AGE. No other reason (no play that I could tell). The steering was never the same and the steering wheel would never come back to center after a turn. Lesson learned.