Johnny Joint acceptable wear

[tombicon]

Hello all.
My mid arm lift was installed in early 2020.
I've been following all the Johnny joint threads and figured it was time to pull my control arms and inspect the joints.
I live in Western Washington where we get lots of rain.
What I found, and am still finding, is that it appears most of my joints MAY not have been greased from the factory.
Almost every ball has pitting on it. Most of the centers of the joint housing have a thick deposit of urothane stuck in place.
I'm fairly certain this has occured do to being dry.
I have found a few that definitely had grease, they look, feel, and act differently than those without.
MY big question for those who know more/ better than I, should I be buying new cups and balls?
So far I have noticed about half of the balls are pitted.

 

[jjvw]

The balls were never smooth to begin with. When assembled, are they loose in the races?

 

[HornedToad]

That’s about how most of mine looked after about a year. They were near impossible to move and creaked like the dickens. I now disassemble and grease them twice a year because I hate the creaking. The “pitting” you see is how mine looked too, even when fairly new.

 

[tombicon]

The balls were never smooth to begin with. When assembled, are they loose in the races?

Josh,
When I removed them, not at all.
Rusty and so tight I could not get the ball to center, and had to use a 12" punch to center them in the disassembly tool.
After wire wheel the balls, and cleaning the cups w mineral spirits and steel wool, then reassembling, they are very "moveable".
Very easy to move. None that I have removed so far have been moveable by hand, until the cleaning process

 

[tombicon]

That’s about how most of mine looked after about a year. They were near impossible to move and creaked like the dickens. I now disassemble and grease them twice a year because I hate the creaking. The “pitting” you see is how mine looked too, even when fairly new.

That’s about how most of mine looked after about a year. They were near impossible to move and creaked like the dickens. I now disassemble and grease them twice a year because I hate the creaking. The “pitting” you see is how mine looked too, even when fairly new.

I think I'll follow your maintenance schedule and just see how they do.
Thank you for sharing your experience.

 

[mrblaine]

Josh,
When I removed them, not at all.
Rusty and so tight I could not get the ball to center, and had to use a 12" punch to center them in the disassembly tool.
After wire wheel the balls, and cleaning the cups w mineral spirits and steel wool, then reassembling, they are very "moveable".
Very easy to move. None that I have removed so far have been moveable by hand, until the cleaning process

I would not have installed them if they were not greased out of the box. I don't do that sort of stupid ass shit.

 

[tombicon]

I would not have installed them if they were not greased out of the box. I don't do that sort of stupid ass shit.

There are 2 different scenarios when I disassembled the joints.
The first scenario, there were very obvious grease remnants. Those balls were also centered in the housing, or went back to center easily. I found remnants of grease in those, or semi a dried remnants. They also (for the most part) had no rust on the ball itself.
Then, there were several, about half, that were so rusted, I could not use the disassembly tool without first soaking them in Kroil. Then after waiting a bit, I was able to force the ball to the center and, could then use the disassembly tool on them.
Those mostly had rust in the cups, and I really could find no evidence of past grease.

I'm not accusing anyone of any wrong, I just said it appears they were dry from the factory. I have heard that before. I don't know if its true.
When I called and spoke to someone at rock jock, I felt like that person deflected, and actually said he didn't know if they came greased, and tried to throw blame at savvy.
I really don't care. I'm just trying to learn, and do right.
Was basically asking a question.
Hoping to not have to buy new balls and caps.
And, because I do drive quite a bit over the road, which is soaking wet about half the year, I've come to realize these take a lot of road spray, which makes me think they need to be maintained much more often than I have in the past.
This is the first time they have been off since they were installed.

 

[mrblaine]

There are 2 different scenarios when I disassembled the joints.
The first scenario, there were very obvious grease remnants. Those balls were also centered in the housing, or went back to center easily. I found remnants of grease in those, or semi a dried remnants. They also (for the most part) had no rust on the ball itself.
Then, there were several, about half, that were so rusted, I could not use the disassembly tool without first soaking them in Kroil. Then after waiting a bit, I was able to force the ball to the center and, could then use the disassembly tool on them.
Those mostly had rust in the cups, and I really could find no evidence of past grease.

I'm not accusing anyone of any wrong, I just said it appears they were dry from the factory. I have heard that before. I don't know if its true.
When I called and spoke to someone at rock jock, I felt like that person deflected, and actually said he didn't know if they came greased, and tried to throw blame at savvy.
I really don't care. I'm just trying to learn, and do right.
Was basically asking a question.
Hoping to not have to buy new balls and caps.
And, because I do drive quite a bit over the road, which is soaking wet about half the year, I've come to realize these take a lot of road spray, which makes me think they need to be maintained much more often than I have in the past.
This is the first time they have been off since they were installed.

It is very easy to find out which one of us is full of shit. Take a new JJ, take it apart, thoroughly clean and remove all the grease from it. Reassemble and go drive it. It will make noise instantly. This has nothing to do with Savvy. They did not assemble the arms, they did not install the suspension, I did and if the joints were dry, I would have fixed that before the rig left here. If it isn't inherently understood, they don't install as they come (the joints) out of the box. We have to manipulate the balls to line up bolts when we install the arms so we know instantly if there is a problem.

If you want to do it right, shorten your maintenance interval to something other than once every 5 years.

 

[tombicon]

It is very easy to find out which one of us is full of shit. Take a new JJ, take it apart, thoroughly clean and remove all the grease from it. Reassemble and go drive it. It will make noise instantly. This has nothing to do with Savvy. They did not assemble the arms, they did not install the suspension, I did and if the joints were dry, I would have fixed that before the rig left here. If it isn't inherently understood, they don't install as they come (the joints) out of the box. We have to manipulate the balls to line up bolts when we install the arms so we know instantly if there is a problem.

If you want to do it right, shorten your maintenance interval to something other than once every 5 years.

I'm pretty certain that is the end result, and what I ended with.
Thank you very much!

 

[mrblaine]

I'm not accusing anyone of any wrong, I just said it appears they were dry from the factory. I have heard that before. I don't know if its true.
When I called and spoke to someone at rock jock, I felt like that person deflected, and actually said he didn't know if they came greased, and tried to throw blame at savvy.

You have to be a special kind of silly to expect anyone at Rock Jock to admit they sent out joints without grease in them. That and the info about greasing them at regular intervals is well known and well documented on here and especially for anyone who lives in the mud.

I really don't care. I'm just trying to learn, and do right.
Was basically asking a question.
Hoping to not have to buy new balls and caps.
And, because I do drive quite a bit over the road, which is soaking wet about half the year, I've come to realize these take a lot of road spray, which makes me think they need to be maintained much more often than I have in the past.
This is the first time they have been off since they were installed.

I explained that you needed to do maintenance. Now you understand why.