Brandy New Front End

[jb034]

Got a lot accomplished this weekend on the Yuk. Its been about 17 years since the front end has seen new parts and I don't think I could have gone much longer on oe. If anyone needs recommendations on parts take my word and go to rockauto. I got upper/lower Moog ball joints, Raybestos inner/outer tie rods, tie rod sleeves, Center link, pitman arm, idler arm, and 2 rough country shocks. All for a little under $200 dollars. Just make sure you have the right part in your cart because they have many different applications. My two mechanic buddies did the whole job for $400 bucks out the door and did an awesome job. The only snag was having to grind and tap out the damn rivets on the uppers. Got bolt on uppers so we dont have to do it again. All together about 9 hours and $600 dollars later my entire front end is done. Drives like a new truck!! Thought I did pretty well

 

[RGV2DRHOE]

Rockauto is awesome! I have a cart at rockauto right now with upper/lower ball joints, tierods, pitman, idler, stabilizer end links, and stabilizer bushings, for about 180, there prices are awesome, only reason I haven't bought them is I just dont know who I can find to do the ball joints for me w/o charging me an arm and a leg. I bet the old hoe would feel awesome with a new front end and I wouldnt have to hear that clunking noise everytime I hit a bump.

 

[TruckinAin4Sissies]

Heh.. "Old Ho".

My cart's stuffed there as well. I'm going to attempt to do the install myself.

 

[ndians68]

we should be ordering all of this soon for the 88, its probably going to be the winter break project

 

[ChrisAU]

Wow I wish I could scrape up the $ to have this done...I don't have a facility to do it myself or I would, and after asking around about my intake gaskets I'm terrified to call about this job.

 

[RGV2DRHOE]

Wow I wish I could scrape up the $ to have this done...I don't have a facility to do it myself or I would, and after asking around about my intake gaskets I'm terrified to call about this job.

You dont wanna know lol, the only shop I called was quoting me around 1200 dollars, saying the ball joints alone were going to be 8-10 hours of labor. I told them they were crazy, I know my pops and I can get it done just dont know if we can do it in a weekend and I absolutely have to have my truck during the week.

 

[jb034]

Im lucky that my buddy is a mechanic he charged me 50 an hour and had a little less that 10 hours into it with another mechanics help. There first time doing it too haha. So all in all if you have the right tools like ball joint press, idler arm, pitman arm puller you can do this in a full day by yourself. Ball joints should only take about 6 hours the only hard part is grinding and tapping the upper rivets

 

[ChrisAU]

It'd almost be worth it to just buy new UCA's...

 

[DRAGGIN95]

Yes this can definitly be done in 1 day with the right tool's, I have done this more times than I care to count.

 

[jb034]

It'd almost be worth it to just buy new UCA's...

My UCAs are the scariest looking things you've ever seen and I still rather tap them out instead of getting new ones. It really wasnt that bad. After watching the guys do it I feel like I could do it in a day or two