Did some one say "what's a ball joint flip"

[chevydan3]

NEVER herd of the 4 bolts breaking EVER and if someone says they have, I WILL call BS and ask for proof! Those 4 bolts ARE NOT seeing any real shear stress nor are they seeing much of any other stress EXCEPT at full droop. And even then there isnt a lot of momentum as the uppers dont have a lot of down travel even stock. ADD into the equation that the movement in the ball joint natuarally reduces the stress on the bolts. What you are talking about is when the ball joint its self separates and it DOES NOT matter if the ball joint is mounted on top or bottom of the a-arm. If the ball joint separates the top of the spindle is going to be loose no matter where the ball joint is bolted to the arm. The ball joint will separate long before those 4 little bolts break.



And you NEVER hear of the 4 little bolts breaking.



Really depends on the back space of the wheels. I have flipped ball joints and 15" wheels and not even close to rubbing but I do believe the stock 16's will rub due to their backspace/offset.

And to the original poster looks good man and should help a lot with the ride it looks as though you was riding right on the droop stops before.

I, myself, have actually had the experience of the 4 bolts breaking. Went on an easy wheeling trip, when we stopped for lunch, I noticed that one of the bolts was gone. Continued down the trail, because I still had 3 bolts left and it was the only way home. Couple miles down the trail, we heard a "ping-ping" and the front wheel folded in. The other 3 bolts all sheared at the same time, driving straight on a dirt road. I don't attribute it to poor design or a result of my balljoint flip or my lift kit, I actually think that the bolts in my replacement balljoints where just Chinese and not up to the task.

I felt the need to chime in, because somebody said that it "never" happens and it happened to me. There is no problem with the bj flip, it is just harder to align sometimes, but it can help the upper ball joint live longer too.

 

[Crash]

I was close to the stops but I had a 1.25" of droop at the wheel. After I get shocks I'm going to measure it again. It does ride a little better even with the junk shocks that are in it now. Yes it is hard to align, I was able to get it close thou. I think I could get the camber right on if I cranked it up more, I'm not doing that thou. I really like how straight the ball joint is now.

 

[Wagonbacker9]

Hmm. I may need to consider this when I crank the front up to match my rear lift. After the flip I suppose the drive angle on the CVs is the next major concern?

 

[Swims350]

cv's tie rod ends, so it aint gonna fix everything. a diff. drop would help the cv's not much to help the tie rods tho.

 

[Wagonbacker9]

cv's tie rod ends, so it aint gonna fix everything. a diff. drop would help the cv's not much to help the tie rods tho.

I've got no plans to go crazy with it, but using this to improve ball joint life may help. I'm operating under the assumption that at 203K just about everything in my front end deserves going through. The question is whether or not just doing a SAS would actually be cheaper than replacing all the IFS crap at this point.

 

[Balzer]

Heres the pic of my ball joint flip with 15x8 wheels zero offset or nutral offset whatever the correct term is.

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[the big blue bus]

after the bj flip how was the camber of your tires? mine currently sit with the bottome edge out. need to adjust em but dont want to pay a guy to do it when it will just get messd up boucing around in feilds and mud holes

 

[Balzer]

My truck is cranked, honestly a bit too much. When I got this truck the upper a-arms where just not right. I though someone had put newer body style a-arms on it. I took it to my local big O store and had them change the upper a-arms, put stock TB keys in, put in new upper balljoints, level the truck and do an alignment. They told me the way it is right now it just barely reached into stock specs. Turned out the a-arms that was on it was on the wrong sides and they had 1 ton TB keys on it.

It rides nice, and stears good. The only downfall I have noticed is in reverse, when you turn the wheel a little it will want to turn more (I'm not an alignment guy but I think that is called caster?) not serious it doesnt jerk the steering wheel out of my hands or anything, but if I was to let go it would stear its self in reverse.

As you can see its cranked a little high, those are 31x10.50x15's on it and it looks like I could clear 35's with some trimming of the fenders/bumper. I might go to a 285x70x17 *33ish tall* but I really like the way it sits right now.

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[Swims350]

not sure on 1 ton keys, I heard the 3/4 ton keys will LOWER a 1/2 ton, so I'm guessing' stock 1 tons would be the same maybe not, unless they used bars to go with it?

 

[Balzer]

Honestly Im just going by what they told me. They showed me the keys that came out and you could tell the bars where a bit smaller than the holes in the keys You could see how the points of the hex head of the bars was only contacting the flats of the keys. Think of a wrench thats too big on a bolt, like a 15mm on a 9/16 bolt, it kinda works but if you really put out on it, it will slip. Its all fixed now and rides and drives good.