Need new king pins

im gonna look into how i would mount these when i crawl under truck this weekend

 

If you dont Jack up the front end, you aren't unloading the pressure off the king pins.

Theres alot of side pressure on the top king pin bushing in the knuckle, unloading the pressure off the king pins by jacking it up gets the grease all around those top bushings.

 

Go to your grocery store and talk to someone in the bakery department. Ask them to save you some buckets. Cake icing comes in buckets not much bigger around than a coffee can. I think they are 1.5 gallon sizes.

I cut mine in half with a cut off wheel. A hack saw would work fine but I'm lazy. Then i cut the bottom section out so it will go over the yoke with about 2 inches in the bottom so you can punch or drill out mounting holes. I mount them right to the tail shaft of the tranny and front and rear section of the rear end using existing bolts. The hardest part of the whole process is getting the bolt holes just right.

It will add a couple minutes when you go to grease it cause you will have to pull the truck up a free inches to access the opposite side zerk fitting. Expect the first few times to be a pain in the butt figuring out how far to move the truck to get the driveshaft to spun 180 degrees.

 

I was always taught the grease gets to everything better when you jack up the front end and the king pins are in a free state with no pressure of that heavy truck bearing down on any one point there around the kingpins anywhere. Makes sense to me. I always do it because it only takes a minute to raise it up. And actually the shop who did my kingpins last asked me if I did and said they always recommend raising the front to grease kingpins.

I had a kingpins disaster about 5 years ago. A shop that is well respected around here locally did mine. The #### truck never was right after that and those kingpins were shot again in less than 3 years time. After they did the job whenever I made a left or right turn and let go of the steering wheel it would not self correct itself to center. I had to actually steer it back to center after I completed my turn. And driving on the interstate I was constantly having to bump it to correct it to center. It was like it would stick to the left, bump it, then stick to the right. Very frustrating. I should have had the kingpins done again but I didn't. They tried adding some caster. Nothing ever fixed it until those kingpins wore out and were replaced again a few short years later.

I would say get a shop that knows what they are doing but that's what I did and it didn't work out for me. Stuff happens and it sucks when people dont do their job right.

 

For something like kingpins you really want a shop that specializes in that stuff. Any major suspension repair should go to a frame and susension shop, not a general repair shop.

As for jacking it up, that obviously isn't going to hurt anything so keep doing it if you want. However something to think about. A typical unladen truck has less than 12k lbs on the steer axle right? A typical off the shelf generic lever action grease gun applies grease at 7k to 10k lbs psi which is more than enough to compensate for any load the weight of the truck is applying to the king pins.

 

Yep I took it to TAFA in Nashville, TN. TAFA stands for Truck Axle & Frame Alignment. That's what they do, or did. They had been in business for over 40 years and everyone in middle TN used to take their coaches, school buses, dump trucks, and semi's there. They had an excellent reputation but they sure enough screwed up my kingpins.

They closed up shop about a year after that, got bought up by Thompson CAT is what I heard, who laid everyone off except for 2 or 3 techs and closed the doors. Now I use their competitor Five-oh-five shop on Spence Lane for that kind of work.

Something else to consider. The grease is going to flow the path of least resistance. With the front raised up in a free state that allows it go everywhere more easily. You'll end up with dry spots hardly getting any lubricant at all if you don't raise it up. Think about it. Why would the grease exert 7,000 lbs of pressure to go to those points that are in a bind from the weight of the truck when all it has to do is go the path of least resistance to pop out somewhere? I've done it both ways and you can see a diffence in where the grease comes out raised versus not. But it's a personal preference do what makes you happy.

 

I’ve never jacked mine up, and By God they were right. King pins are a little loose, only lasted 2.2 million miles. Better jack em up.

 

Sounds like they put too thick of shims. I’ve decided to do my own, it’s really a simple job. Nothing too specialized about it.

 

Yeah grease is an amazing product

 

I agree with king pins being a simple job until 1 of 2 things happen.

1. you cant get the old the old king pin outta the axle beam.

2. You get the king pin out of the axle eye and you discover it needs bored out and sleeved.