Control arm and wheel bearings

So finally took to a sprinter tech in alaska. 2nd mechanic to tell me play in the wheels and need for ball joints and maybe wheel bearings. Quoted price at trailer craft is about 2300 for both front control arms and wheel bearings . How doable is this in reality to diy at home with only 1 jack. I’m not trying to accumulate a bunch of extra stuff as I don’t have a place after July. Also is there anything to do with five old glow plugs and an old control module?? 172K on the odometer.

Rock fencer.
At 172k your ball joints will be still good, if your tech new how to test the joints that would be better, jacking up under the wish bone takes the load of the ball and cup allowing the wheel to move about. Just leave it alone until you can get more skilled person to look at it. Eric.

I agree with Eric, correct MB procedure to check ball joints is here...

View attachment Ball Joint GI33.00-N-039932_Ver_3.pdf

Keith.

I will repeat for SAFETY and avoid ball pin detachment in service, which will certainly result in a loss of steering with the risk of the vehicle going out of control.
The bulletin draws attention to water ingress into the joint causing corrosion & contingent wear .

It doesn't address wear parameters which is best observed by doing an initial alignment test on turntables to observe the actual wear and drift of spec on the ball joint when rotated from lock to lock.
quote:-
When raising the vehicle, monitor whether there is lateral misalignment (radial play) in the supporting ball joint.
Misalignment of more than 3 mm is rated as a considerable defect by the technical inspection associations.


Only the other day we addressed a T1N van that had about 135,000 miles on it, and when the front end was raised the driver's side ball pillar detached itself from the socket.

Sometime I cannot help thinking this bulletin has some policy influence by Dodge .
When this bulletin was released Dodge also refused to deal with excess wear in the same lower ball joint location on PU's, citating water ingress! Until that is, frequent complaints of detachment were experienced across the whole of the NA parc with ball joint failures. Some related to collisions causing injury.
NHTSA had to intervene to change MOPAR policy.
So beware and the joint is cheap at about $60 a pop.
Basically not worth the risk if there are doubts about its serviceability .
Dennis

Im going to assume , maybe i shouldn’t, that the sprinter tech at the only shop that services and sells sprinters knows that protocol. Van was used in New England as a cabinet shop van and I’ve driven it off road it infrequently in the past year so I would venture there is some wear. Thanks for the feedback. Still not sure I’d diy this. Dennis would you replace just the ball joint or get the parts from EuroSD and replace the whole control arm as I don’t have access to a press?

T

rock_fencer said:

Im going to assume , maybe i shouldn’t, that the sprinter tech at the only shop that services and sells sprinters knows that protocol. Van was used in New England as a cabinet shop van and I’ve driven it off road it infrequently in the past year so I would venture there is some wear. Thanks for the feedback. Still not sure I’d diy this. Dennis would you replace just the ball joint or get the parts from EuroSD and replace the whole control arm as I don’t have access to a press?

T

Click to expand...

Well the ball joint is pressed into the arm, so you need to remove it to do any pressing exercise.
We use a portable hydraulic press by Muller Werzuege to R'n R them insitu, but even that can be a chore at times.

The complete arm isn't too expensive from SD and you do get the two silentbloc included which make install very easy as well. Just position the arm on the mid swing position before tightening the two fixing bolts.
All the best
Dennis

I did the full control arm/ball joint replacement last year. I used all Moog parts, and the fitment is a little off. The stock control arms are a little beefier. With jack stands it’s doable. If the bolts are rusted in place, like one of mine was, it could be a bit of a nightmare, but not really complicated otherwise. Wheel bearings aren’t too bad either, just make sure to buy new rear seals as they can be easy to damage taking out. Coming from a guy who kind of learned how to work on cars by working on a sprinter.