2006-08 Dodge Ram 1500 Front 10 Piece Steering & Suspension Kit TRQ PSA70031

Okay, friends, to get started on this vehicle, the first thing we wanna talk about is safety. You want hand and eye protection. Secondly, you wanna make sure that you raise and support the vehicle by the frame so the suspension is hanging. Next, let's remove our lug nuts. Remove your wheel. Now that we have the wheel off, we have a nice, clear view of our tie rod ends. Just a quick note, whenever I'm replacing tie rod ends, I usually like to do them as a pair. With that said, let's break free our jam nut. Here, we are.

Let's get our locking cotter pin out of here. Here we are. Let's go ahead and remove this nut. Put that back on a couple of threads. The next thing we're gonna do is separate the tie rod end from the knuckle itself. You can do that with a couple loving bonks, with a hammer. Unscrew the outer tie rod end and make sure you count the threads as you come off, 1, 2, 3 and so on. 22 for me. The next thing we need to do is remove our jam nut from our inner tie rod end. I'm gonna hold that inner tie rod end with some locking pliers.

Next, we're gonna remove the clamp that holds our Bellows boot to the inner tie rod end. So now if you follow your boot towards the inside where your power steering rack is, you're gonna find that there's a little lip right here. You're gonna wanna just kind of have a nice pry bar like this and a hammer, and we're gonna break that free. It's not reusable, so you're gonna have to replace it with something different. Now, let's go ahead and grab onto that boot. Give it a nice twist to break it free. And we're gonna try to pull it off of the inner tie rod end. There it is.

Double check your boot, make sure it's not worn or torn in any way. If it is, you'd wanna replace it, this one looks great. Now we have to unscrew our inner tie rod end from the rack itself. To do that, you can use a tool that looks like this. It's just gonna go around the bobble down here. Or of course you can use pliers or even a wrench. Whatever you need to do, unscrew it. Okay let's get this off of here. Now that that's off, I always like to clean up the mess that might be around the area, clean up the threads and then of course around it. Time to start in our new inner tie rod end. I like to use a little bit of threadlocker, but we'll call it your prerogative.

Once you have it bottomed out, just make sure you go ahead and give it a little snug. Your inner tie rod end came with some grease. You're gonna use that right along this area right here and then a little bit on the inner tie rod and shaft. I like to use a nice brush I don't like to get it on my hands. Just pack it right in there and make sure it's nice and lubricated and then some right up along this groove right there. That's where the boot's gonna sit. This is gonna help your alignment be professional. The next thing we need to do is prepare our boot so it can be mounted. Take a nice wire tie, I'm just gonna start right on here. Here we are, not too tight. Do the same on the other side, if you're not reusing your clamp, take your boot. We're gonna slide it right on there. Slide it over the rack so you're sure it's nice and secure. That feels good.

We're gonna slide this forward end so it goes over that little lip. You can see it right there, put it right up against it. Perfect. Make sure your boot's sitting perfectly on the rack. And now we're going to snug everything up. Trim from off the excess. Next, we're gonna put a little bit of grease or copper, never seize on the threaded area here. Go ahead and put on your jam nut, put it halfway down the threaded area. Time to put on the outer tie rod end. Make sure you put on as many turns as you did to remove the original 1, 2, 3, and so on. That should line up perfectly. If it doesn't you might've moved this a little bit, or you might be off. Snug this up, torque this to 45 foot-pounds.

Now we need to take a look and make sure that the slotted area of our nut lines up with the hole in the tie rod stud, if it doesn't, you need to continue tightening until the first one does. Go ahead and pin that over. Now, it's gonna be time to tighten our jam nut. To do that, you wanna hold your tie rod so it can't spin because you don't wanna damage the ball and socket area. Now let's go ahead and snug this. There we go. If your tie rods crooked, just make sure you straighten it out so it's level with the ground. Go ahead and put the wheel back up on here. We're gonna start all of our lug nuts and then we'll torque them to 130 foot-pounds. Torqued.

Okay, friends, to get started on this vehicle, the first thing we wanna talk about is safety. You want hand and eye protection. Secondly, you wanna make sure that you raise and support the vehicle by the frame so the suspension's hanging. Next, let's remove our lug nuts. Remove your wheel. Next, we're gonna move right down here and we're gonna remove this nut. I'm just gonna take a nice pair of locking pliers like this. Clamp it onto this stud. Make it as tight as possible. Let's remove that 18-millimeter nut. Okay. For us personally, where the top of ours is broken, this is gonna come out nice and easy. If you still have the top of the stud on your sway bar link, what you're gonna notice is it's gonna be very hard to get it out. You could try to pry up on the pry bar and see if you can squeeze it out. So now's the perfect time to go over and remove the right front as well. There we are. When you're just replacing the control arm the only thing you really need to take off of the sway bar link is the lower nut down here. You can leave the top on. Ours was broken, so I'm just gonna replace it anyway.

Let's go ahead and spray down our hardware right here that holds the control arm to the frame. The lower area where your shock connects to your control arm is gonna be the biggest hassle for you. This bolt right here tends to freeze up inside there and it's gonna be an issue. It couldn't hurt to spray it down, but it's gonna be kind of one of those things that you're gonna wanna replace the bolt with the nut anyway.

Now, the next thing we need to do is remove our caliper, but when you do that, you wanna make sure you don't leave it hanging on the hose here. So I like to use a nice bungee cord, we'll take it off, and then we're gonna hang it so it's secure without putting a tug on our flex hose. Make sure you hang this caliper from something other than your actual brake hose. So let's go ahead and remove the rotor as well. Let's follow our ABS wire up. We're gonna disconnect it from up here. There's gonna be a little red tab. Pull that down, squeeze on this button right here, and then separate the two pieces. Let's get that ABS wire down so it's nice and safe.

Next, let's remove our 36-millimeter axle nut. Next, we need to break the axle free from the bearing. You can either try to push on it, if it doesn't move, there's a little center hole right there, use a punch with a hammer and give it a couple loving bonks. Just be careful not to damage the threads of your axle. The next thing we need to do is remove our outer tie rod end from the knuckle itself. Ours has a little cotter pin, so of course we're gonna remove that and then we'll remove the nut as well. Now we need to separate the tie rod from the knuckle. I'm just gonna bonk lightly right here, cause a little bit of vibration so it breaks free.

The next thing we need to do is separate the upper ball joint from the knuckle itself right here. Remove this nut. Just be careful when it breaks free, this might wanna fall down. A couple loving bonks, or one. Remove that nut. Just go ahead and push on the axle a little bit, make sure it's broken free. Let's remove that nut. Just gonna put that back on a couple threads. Let's go ahead and bonk on the knuckle again, holding onto the knuckle. Let's get the axle out of here. I'm just gonna tie up this axle so there's no way it can flop around.

Now we need to separate the strut from the lower control arm. The next thing that we're gonna do is remove our bolts that hold the control arm to the frame itself. With that said, there really isn't much else holding the control arm in, so you wanna be very careful once they're both loose, it could swing down and potentially hurt you. Let's go ahead and start that nut on so it's flush. Now we'll give it a couple loving bonks with our hammer just to try to break it free. Okay. All right. Now that we have everything broken free here, let's leave it just like it is with the nuts still on there and the bolt in there. We're gonna do the same to the rear.

Move this around quite freely. I'm gonna go ahead and remove that forward bolt. There it is. Set that aside. You should be able to wiggle this and remove it from here. There it is, friends. Okay, friends, now it's gonna be time to get our brand new lower control arm in here. Something I like to mention is I like to replace the bolts if I have the access to them. And I also like to put a little bit of grease on them. With that said, let's go ahead and start the control arm in here like this. Go ahead and get it into the back just to get them started again. There we are. You have your little cam right here. That's the circle or the oblong. It's gonna kind of fit inside these grooves right there. You want it facing up. Prime in those. Put them facing up as well, and then of course your new nut. It's a good idea to use some thread locker if you're not replacing your hardware. Get the control arm here.

The next thing we wanna do is try to level up our lower control arm so it'll be pretty much at ride height if the vehicle is on the ground. All right, so now I'm gonna make sure that that forward cam is nice and straight. Make sure this is sitting into its groove where it needs to be. And this one as well. Then get the jack out from under there. Now let's torque these bolts to 150 foot-pounds. Let's torque this bolt to 155 foot-pounds. Let's get our axle down from here and grab our knuckle. Take your knuckle and of course your lower ball-joint nut. We're gonna start the axle inside the wheel bearing here and then start the lower ball joint at the same time. Go ahead and start on that lower ball-joint nut. Put a nice pry bar up top of your upper control arm. Go ahead and lower that down through and then take your nut, start it on there. Bottom out the lower ball-joint nut. Let's do the same to the upper ball joint. Torque your upper ball joint nut to 40 foot-pounds. Let's torque this lower ball joint to 38 foot-pounds. Let's get our ABS wire reattached here.

If you were to look underneath the control arm, you can see where there's a little slot and then of course there's a little dimple where this is gonna go into. Let's just line those up. Make sure that this is nice and secure, you don't want it falling back out. Make sure it clicks. Lock it and then put it right through the back so it comes through that hole. There we are. Make sure it's not caught anywhere. This looks great. Something you wanna make sure you do is clean down the hub surface where the rotor is gonna be, and you also wanna make sure you clean down the back of the rotor surface where the hub's gonna make. You can use a little brush like this if you got a while or use a nice sanding disc like this and clean it up nice and pretty. Okay. So this looks pretty good, let's go ahead and spray it with some Copper Never-Seez. Let's get our rotor back on here. I like to put a lug nut to hold it on. Now obviously, this brake rotor isn't in the best condition, we're gonna end up replacing it overall. But for this process, let's continue on. Let's get our caliper back on here now. Two caliper mounting bolts. If you wanna use some thread locker, we'll call it your prerogative. Go ahead and start them in and then we'll snug them up and torque them to manufacturer specifications. Let's torque these bolts to 130 foot-pounds. Torqued.

Now let's get our outer tie rod back into the knuckle. Let's torque this to 45 foot-pounds. Now you wanna look at where your slotted nut is in comparison to where the hole is in the tie rod stud. If it's not lined up, you need to continue tightening until the next slot. This needs to go a little further. Make sure you peen over your cotter pin. Perfect. Now let's get our axle nut back on here. It's a good idea to replace the nut, but if you can't for some reason, make sure you use a little thread locker. You can slide it into either direction you want, then of course we're gonna bring the bar down once we have the other side in as well. Start this nut on here. Looking at the lower aspect of the sway bar link where it's gonna connect to the actual control arm, you can see there's like a little nut there. We're gonna hold that and then turn this. Now we're gonna snug up this nut, and we're just gonna watch these bushings right here. You wanna see them touch up against the bar but you definitely don't wanna see them squished down so they look like a pancake and start bubbling out. That looks pretty great right there. You can see it's squished down here, squished down there. It's definitely making contact with both sides of the bar. Do the same thing to the other side and make sure you have the same amount of threads on both sides. Let's torque this to 20 foot-pounds.

The next thing we need to do is torque our axle nut. To do that, there's a couple different ways you can do it. You can either put the wheel back on with the center open and then of course you'd be able to do that. But for us personally, we're gonna use this bar coming across the studs to the ground to hold leverage and let's torque this to 185 foot-pounds. Torqued. Go ahead and put the wheel back up on here. We're gonna start all of our lug nuts and then we'll torque them to 130 foot-pounds.

Torqued. Now let's pump up the brake. That feels good.

Okay, friends. To get started on this vehicle, the first thing we want to talk about is safety. You want hand and eye protection. Secondly, you want to make sure that you raise and support the vehicle by the frame so the suspension's hanging. Next, let's remove our lug nuts. Remove your wheel. Okay, friends. So here's our front sway bar link. As you can tell ours is broken at the top. So I have the new one here to show you. If you were to look at it, you have the stud that comes down through the bottom of the control arm. Following it up, you're going to find another stud up along the top that comes to the top of the sway bar itself. On top of that, there'll be a little bushing, a washer, and a nice nut. You would of course remove the nut and then the washer and the bushing, and then you'll be left with this.

Next, we're going to move right down here and we're going to remove this nut. I'm just going to take a nice pair of locking pliers like this, clamp it onto this stud, make it as tight as possible. Let's remove that 18 millimeter nut. Okay, for us personally, where the top of ours is broken, this is going to come out nice and easy. If you still had the top of the stud on your sway bar link, what you're going to notice is it's going to be very hard to get it out. You could try to pry up on the pry bar and see if you can squeeze it out. But in all actuality, when you're replacing sway bar links, you do them as a pair anyway. So now's a perfect time to go over and remove the right one as well.

Here we are. There's our old sway bar link. Let's dispose of this properly and grab our new one. Let's go ahead and take apart our sway bar link so it looks like this with a washer and one bushing up along the top there. You can slide it into either direction you want, and then of course, we're going to bring the bar down once we have the other side in as well. Let's start this nut on here. Looking at the lower aspect of the sway bar link, where it's going to connect to the actual control arm, you can see there's like a little nut there. We're going to hold that and then turn this.

Now we're going to snug up this nut and we're just going to watch these bushings right here. You wanna see them touch up against the bar, but you definitely don't want to see them squished down so they look like a pancake and start bubbling out. That looks pretty great right there. You can see it's squished down here, squished down there. It's definitely making contact with both sides of the bar. Do the same thing to the other side and make sure you have the same amount of threads on both sides. Let's torque this to 20 foot-pounds. Go ahead and put the wheel back up on here. We're going to start all of our lug nuts and then we'll torque them to 130 foot-pounds. Torqued.

Okay, friends. One of the first things we need to do is safely raise and support the vehicle so that the suspension is hanging. The best way to do that is right underneath the frame. Once you've done that, remove all five lug nuts and remove the wheel. We're gonna go around the knuckle just like this, and then I'm gonna bring it over to the frame. Perfect. Next, we need to remove this nut right here, you're gonna notice there's a little bit of a locking neoprene in there. If you need to heat it up a little bit it probably be helpful. We're gonna remove this and then we'll separate the two. That nut put on just a couple of threads. Now we're gonna bonk on the knuckle a little bit, try to separate the two. Just keep in mind that this will try to pull away. Okay. Let's carefully move the knuckles away.

The next thing we need to do to get the upper control arm off is to remove the two mounting bolts. There's one here and there's one on the forward side of the control arm as well. Here we are. Alright, let's leave that just like that and do the forward one. Here we are. There it is friends. Now it's gonna be time to get our brand new control arm in here. Let's go ahead and start pulling the bolts in. Here we are. A little bit of threadlocker. Let's start on our nuts here. The next thing we need to do is lift up our control arm, I like to use a nice pry bar. Go right in between like this so that the control arms level with the way it would look if the vehicle is on the ground. Torque this to 130 foot-pounds. Do the same to the forward bolt, line up your ball joint stud with the knuckle hole, and use a pry bar to pull it down. Start that knot on there. Let's go and snug this up. The lower ball joint nut as well. Torque your upper ball joint nut to 40 foot-pounds. Now it's gonna be time to get the wheel up on here. We're gonna snug up the lug nuts and we'll torque it to 130 foot-pounds. Torqued.

Okay, friends. To get started on this vehicle, the first thing we wanna talk about is safety. You want hand and eye protection. Secondly, you wanna make sure that you raise and support the vehicle by the frame so the suspension's hanging. Next, let's remove our lug nuts. Remove your wheel. Now that we have the wheel off, we have a nice, clear view of our tie rod ends. Just a quick note, whenever I'm replacing tire rod ends, I usually like to do them as a pair. With that said, let's break free our jam nut.

Here we are. Let's get our locking cotter pin out of here. There we are. Let's go ahead and remove this nut. Put that back on a couple of threads. The next thing we're gonna do is separate the tie rod end from the knuckle itself. You can do that with a couple loving bonks with a hammer. Unscrew the outer tie rod end and make sure you count the threads as you come off, one, two, three, and so on. Twenty-two for me. Time to put on the outer tie rod end. Make sure you put on as many turns as you did to remove the original, one, two, three, and so on. That should line up perfectly. If it doesn't, you might've moved this a little bit or you might be off. Snug this up, torque this to 45 foot-pounds. Now we need to take a look and make sure that the slotted area of our nut lines up with the hole in the tie rod stud. If it doesn't, you need to continue tightening until the first one does. Go ahead and peen that over.

Now it's gonna be time to tighten our jam nut. To do that, you wanna hold your tie rod so it can't spin because you don't wanna damage the ball and socket area. Now let's go ahead and snug this. There we go. If your tire rod's crooked, just make sure you straighten it out so it's level with the ground. Go ahead and put the wheel back up on here. We're gonna start all of our lug nuts and then we'll torque them to 130 foot-pounds.