Crap, mine started squeaking a lot today.

Did it every once in a while, but all off a sudden it is doing it often.

Also, noticed that the steering effort is sorta high, but many complain this car has overboosted steering, so the high effort could be sign of high ball joint friction.

Any advice on replacing? Any advice on brands? I may not have much choice to do quickly.

Merry Christmas CL members!

 

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Go with OEM, at sewell

 

I need to do it tomorrow, so I don't have the luxury of ordering in, this is my DD and I can't really afford downtime (I commute 40 miles each way). Moog is known for often redesigning the OEM design to become much more reliable. I haven't personally heard bad anything on them.

I am used to my GM cars having 250k+ miles on factory installed ball joints without issues. But most are greaseable and I prefer greaseable....

Mine doesn't squeak ALL the time, but it is close, it is just doing it a LOT more in the last couple days.

 

^^go with Moog. Great quality part and ready available. I understand your pain because I didn't replace my infiniti q45 bj's until 225kI and they were nongrease version.

 

Theres your answer. Not sure why people ask for advice, and then answer their own questions

 

You've read the threads...you know what to do. Go with Moog on your own discretion. I would go OEM 2001+

...and Merry Christmas to you as well

 

Is the 2001+ design better? Moog was listing the same from 98-04 IIRC.

 

You already know they are bad why dont you just replace them instead of making a thread? There are bunch of ball joint threads out there.

 

I guess the forum has no use anymore, lock all threads and close it. I guess talk and conversation about cars we have is useless and all topics are talked about and the useless search engine on it is all we need.

I guess this post means very little.

https://www.clublexus.com/forums/gs-...-gs-forum.html

 

replace replace replace them asap

 

Amazon Prime 2 day shipping at the best prices on the net...Links for you

http://www.amazon.com/Beck-Arnley-10...5381184&sr=1-1

http://www.amazon.com/Moog-K5103-Low...5381184&sr=1-2

Good Luck!

 

Would it be a good idea to replace both driver and passenger side ball joints? My passenger side has been squeaking and steering effort is heavy.

And the last time I was in service at Lexus, they told me the upper ball joint might need replacing soon. Is that a common problem also?

 

The upper ball joint on my passenger side wheel went bad so I replaced them.

 

The upper ball joint is mounted on the upper control arm and the dealer offers it only as one item for over $400... The upper ball joints are slightly less common than the lower joints but I did have to replace one upper on my 98 GS300. On my 02 GS300 I noticed it was going bad too, but didnt replace it yet...
For the lower ball joints, I suggest go with dealer parts and do both since you have to get alignment done after the replacement.
Good Luck

 

This is right. It's one piece with the UCA. The dealer charged me $490 per side.