lower ball joints

[mfinger1]

Greetings All. New to the site. My '01 XLS has 53K. Shop just told me that there was a tad up and down movement, but no side to side on lower ball joints. It passes state inspection. Is this something to cause alarm? Are they yanking me? I do know the stock joints do not have grease fittings, so I guess they wear more?? What seems to be the life expectancy on joints ( two to three tokes- ha, ha).
I do have have 3 yr left on my extended wrty, with deductible, but no sense if not needed. Advice?
thanks everyone! :exp:

 

[Turdle]

If you can get new ones for the deductible, I'd do it yesterday

 

[mfinger1]

This is usually a highway cruiser. What does seem to be the usual normal life expectancy on lower joints?
Oh, and another question....is there a base model below the XLS model. I believe I may have seen a basic, no label model explorer.

Mike

 

[ExplorerDMB]

No, XLS is lowest model -- Lower ball joints life spans vary a lot. Road conditions, usage, load, etc. The lower balljoints are the load carrying ball joint in our explorers and most SUVs and Tucks, but you are right about the non-grease fittings; they do seem to wear out quicker.

-Drew

 

[mfinger1]

ball joints / Explorer model

Yea, that's what I thought, but I swear I saw an explorer 4dr recently that had no XLT badge nor no XLS badge. It seemed like a plain jane. A '98-'01 style. Anyone else have any sitings?