SILENCE!!
I keel you!
Having fought with the noise in the explorer now for what seems like a year, I have blessed, blessed silence.
All of the things I replaced, or tested, and still the noise, which started out as a “chuffchuffchuff” and eventually graduated to a “WOOMWOOMWOOM” was starting to annoy the hell out of me. I had replaced every component of the front end, left and right wheel bearings, differential, CV axles, and driveshaft. A lot of blood, sweat, and tears. Upper and lower balljoints, rotors, brakes. Yadda yadda. Finally, disgusted, I took it to a local trans shop that had been reccomended to me, K&M Transmissions in St John.
They put it on a lift and fired it up.
The (two month old) left front wheel bearing was fucked.
I took it home and swapped it out, and now it runs smooth as silk.
S’what I get for trusting “new” parts. Fuckers. And it’s JUST out of warranty, too, because I bought it not long after i got the truck, and sat it on the shelf until I needed it.
BTW, the partt I put in was a junkyard part. Out of a ‘Cash for Clunkers” car. Smooth. yeah. OEM Ford.
Oh, the trans shop? Didn’t charge me a penny.
Well, at least you didn’t have to swap the diff a second time. Glad it’s fixed.
If I were king….
There would be a 3’x8′ banner on the back wall of every repair shop with these words on it:
“New does not mean good”.
Yeah, Teach, I hear you. But it went in fine, and was fine for a couple months. I had nothing to indicate to me a failure- untilI put a stethoscope to it while running on a rack.
Probably an auto zone part? I replaced a starter on a blazer once with a starter from OReilys every 30 days for about 3 months till I upgraded the damn thing. China flat ass sucks on quality.
Autozone indeed. I hope to get the old part lodged in someone’s keister soon.
I am determined that from now on it’s Moog, Gates, Napa, etc.
A lifetime warranty on a balljoint I have to replace a year later is useless.
I have a new serpentine belt that is longer than the Gates I took off!
Not being a car guru type, and having a good buddy who actually is, I follow his advice and buy my parts, including radiator caps and wiper blades from NAPA. No problems with warranty because all the parts I’ve ever gotten from them worked for years past the warranty period. Including batteries. Sometimes a few bucks more, but not too often.
I used to buy a lot of my repair parts from NAPA. That is until the locally owned chain decided that ‘farmers’ weren’t ‘good’ business. They quit stocking ag equipment bearings and gaskets and made everything special order. Oh, they still try to get me to come in on their ‘oil filter special’ days, but I wouldn’t piss on NAPA if the whole chain was on fire…
All The Best,
Frank W. James