Ball bearings!!

I have Dynatrac balljoints, only 10K miles on them so no claims to life yet. It's a job I only want to do once, so the MOOGs and other cheapies where not an option.

As it was mentioned do the wheel bearings at the same time, if the cash is there then I would opt for a spinfree kit, especially since you said you are not planning on selling anytime soon.

Perrysburg Dodgeboy wrote:
Well I'm in the rust belt and just finished an oil and filter change. At 145,600 miles not one bit of rust on the oil pan, but I wash my truck at least every other week if not every week in the winter.

My oil change cost me almost $160 in parts, 15W40 Amsoil full syn. and their filter, the extended 25,000/12 month. have a sample all bottled up ready to ship out Monday to Blackstone Labs. I did add 2 quarts of the HOT SHOT'S SECRET Stiction Eliminator other wise it would have been $125.

Don

Why are you using the hot shot stuff?

Amsoil is a high detergent oil, and our injectors don't have oil in them like the older power strokes.

I thought you had a 5.9? Why CJ oil?

Grit dog wrote:

panamacamper1 wrote:
In all the videos I watched it seemed pretty straight forward on removing the hubs, what things were done wrong to have to replace hubs? Being that I am in korea, i wont work on it until I getback in nov unless someone else does the work. So moog expensive, got it. Ill keep lookin

For everyone that chimed in and doubted everything that the OP said could be wrong with the truck, YDHAFC.
Oil pans rusting through on the Cummins are fairly common on trucks in the rust belt.
Front unit bearings are also common around 100-150k mi.
$120 for an oil change may seem steep to you doubters until you go buy everything assuming its a lof service, air filter and fuel filter. Yes I can do a complete service on mine for about $70 in parts and I buy in bulk and oil on sale. Add some markup and 1/2 hr labor, you're well over $100. Wake up, it's 2014 not 1994!
Replacing BOTH unit bearings and not the hubs, although sometimes they are so rusted on they get damaged. Buddy and I fabbed a puller to remove the hubs. It saves the hub. Doing both, figure $300 ea side for parts and 3-4 hrs per side. That's $1200 min at a shop.
Oil pan, the motor needs to be raised up a bit to get the old pan out and new one in. Again $3-400 for pan and gasket and $500 at least in shop labor.

$2100 sounds about right for that work.

Couple tips. How do they know the unit bearings are going bad? Ask your wife if the front end is growling or grinding.
Many a rusted oil pan was fixed semi permanently by draining the oil, cleaning it up, prep the steel and apply some jb weld. Personally I'd do the cheap fix if I was driving the truck but I wouldn't trust not having eyes on it and risk losing the engine from a bad oil leak at the hands of my wife. Your call there. Depends if she can keep an eye on it.

Basically you have 2 common Ram repair items that just popped up.
That said I still wouldn't just trust one shop unless you could verify all the work actually needs done.

Haha, good post! Yep, you are the one with a clue.....lmao.

Well I'm in the rust belt and just finished an oil and filter change. At 145,600 miles not one bit of rust on the oil pan, but I wash my truck at least every other week if not every week in the winter.

My oil change cost me almost $160 in parts, 15W40 Amsoil full syn. and their filter, the extended 25,000/12 month. have a sample all bottled up ready to ship out Monday to Blackstone Labs. I did add 2 quarts of the HOT SHOT'S SECRET Stiction Eliminator other wise it would have been $125.

Don

panamacamper1 wrote:
In all the videos I watched it seemed pretty straight forward on removing the hubs, what things were done wrong to have to replace hubs? Being that I am in korea, i wont work on it until I getback in nov unless someone else does the work. So moog expensive, got it. Ill keep lookin

For everyone that chimed in and doubted everything that the OP said could be wrong with the truck, YDHAFC.
Oil pans rusting through on the Cummins are fairly common on trucks in the rust belt.
Front unit bearings are also common around 100-150k mi.
$120 for an oil change may seem steep to you doubters until you go buy everything assuming its a lof service, air filter and fuel filter. Yes I can do a complete service on mine for about $70 in parts and I buy in bulk and oil on sale. Add some markup and 1/2 hr labor, you're well over $100. Wake up, it's 2014 not 1994!
Replacing BOTH unit bearings and not the hubs, although sometimes they are so rusted on they get damaged. Buddy and I fabbed a puller to remove the hubs. It saves the hub. Doing both, figure $300 ea side for parts and 3-4 hrs per side. That's $1200 min at a shop.
Oil pan, the motor needs to be raised up a bit to get the old pan out and new one in. Again $3-400 for pan and gasket and $500 at least in shop labor.

$2100 sounds about right for that work.

Couple tips. How do they know the unit bearings are going bad? Ask your wife if the front end is growling or grinding.
Many a rusted oil pan was fixed semi permanently by draining the oil, cleaning it up, prep the steel and apply some jb weld. Personally I'd do the cheap fix if I was driving the truck but I wouldn't trust not having eyes on it and risk losing the engine from a bad oil leak at the hands of my wife. Your call there. Depends if she can keep an eye on it.

Basically you have 2 common Ram repair items that just popped up.
That said I still wouldn't just trust one shop unless you could verify all the work actually needs done.

First, Thankyou for serving, second cont your research, in which a lot of great info already here. Yep have not seen an oil pan rust out, but some come in plastic now.....kinda scary for me. My oil pan is pot metal on the gm series gas trucks...on my previous 02 I had to take the oil pan off to get the broken dipstick out. Funny now, but when I put it all back I over tightened the corner of the pan and literally snapped it off....... Man gm wants 400.00 for that cheap made pan.... So got a used one for 150.00 and learned another hard lesson in life...lol anyway good luck, and yes my parents old 96 dodge 2500 they had, had the bearings replaced a few times... But at high miles.

Had to replace to transmission pan on my Jeep because of rust. Surface rust formed and went up over the flange and it started leaking.

Mark

JustLabs wrote:
If you plan on keeping the truck for the long haul,I'd go Carli or Dynatrac.

They're expensive,but quality usually is.

I believe your correct. If I had to replace mine today I'd go with Carli just from reading the Ram sites. Still don't have much faith with any of them though. Figure the old motto of " you pay for what you get" still holds true. That's if I'm keeping it, if I were the trade off type guy every 3 years I'd get the cheapest thing I could find.

Yeah I am keeping this thing until its rust holding hands. So quality matters.

Moog may have been quality parts at one time,but they're pretty much junk anymore.

If you plan on keeping the truck for the long haul,I'd go Carli or Dynatrac.

They're expensive,but quality usually is.