Can you have too much grease in a tie-rod?

So every year, when the weather gets cooler, my front end starts squeaking and I go under and grease up the front end. Everything has grease fittings except the 2 connecting pieces (forgot what they are called) that make up the bar that connects both wheels. I got a needle end, that hooks up to my grease gun and I just poke it in the boots there and give it 3 pumps. I give everything else 3 pumps also.

This year, normal squeaking come colder weather. I grease everything up and old betsy goes silent.. but this time about a few days later, shes squeaking again.. thats weird. I grease her again, goes silent for an hour and starts squeaking. I look under and pretty much all my grease is pushed out from the tie rod fittings and ends, the ball joint ones look fine.

How are my fittings pushing the grease out? Can there be too much and its just getting pushed out when the wheel turns and "pulling" the rest of the grease out? Doesnt make any sense to me. Everything seems still to be good, the whole front end is relatively new. The boots arnt cracking or breaking or anything like that.

And just because pictures always help, heres the "connecting pieces" of the bar that goes across the wheels with the tie rod ends on either side.

Ok UPDATE!!

So I've learned these are my inner tie rod ends.

One thing I remember doing is "rotating the boot around" to "spread the grease around inside... which I have never ever done.

Went under the truck and sure enough, the boots have formed into a specific "shape"

And I rotated them around to find their little homes, turned the truck on, had someone turn the wheel for me and watched them move and they wernt pushing out grease (just a normal little bit around the edges) after I greased them up.

So maybe thats all it was LOL

Thank god I didnt goto a shop, they would have said REPLACE! And I just realized that these inner tie rods DO HAVE grease fittings on the side... of course the dealership who charged me under $3,000 for my complete front end so many years ago didnt put grease nipples on these, and as a matter of fact, I found out after the job was done. Nothing had grease in them!!

So, after moving the boots around, is the front end still making noise? It's not unusual for that style of joint boot to overflow grease during use, in my experience.

You may not want to hear this from me? :silly: But it's also been my experience that once a joint starts squeaking, greasing it is just a band-aid. The same squeaking joints also usually have play to some degree. Even if it's not making noise right now, I'd still suggest dry park checking the steering linkage, and inspecting the ball joints for play.

Unfortunately I 100% agree with Tyler once something is squeaking its already worn, and properly checking these parts is crucial to know which parts are bad (for example with suspension hanging you won't have any play in a balljoint thats ready to fall out ) so suspension has to be loaded when checking balljoints and inner tie rods , also if both wheels are off the ground it would be hard to see play in pitman and idler arms years ago when I was just a entry level tech I bought a mustang (maybe 5 years old and almost 100k miles on it) and I gave it the once over new struts, shocks, tie rods, tune up, tires, all the flushes and 2 days later it developed a squeak from the balljoint I had just aligned the car 2 days prior and I didn't find any play so I lifted it up on the 2 post lift checked for play again (didn't find any because suspension wasn't loaded) poked a hole in the boot and sprayed some penetrating oil and and pumped some grease in cranked the wheels a few times and all was quiet I said ok ill deal with it later! The very next day the balljoint fell out of the socket and the tire smashed the fender and and the fender in turn cut the new tire....... add the $100 tow bill and that rookie tech learned all about how to properly check suspension components and a hard lesson about squeaks.....

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Inner tie rods pretty easy to replace? The movotek (spelling?) ones are only $25 each on Rock Auto

Just watched this, maybe I'll give it a go!

Tyler wrote: So, after moving the boots around, is the front end still making noise? It's not unusual for that style of joint boot to overflow grease during use, in my experience.

You may not want to hear this from me? :silly: But it's also been my experience that once a joint starts squeaking, greasing it is just a band-aid. The same squeaking joints also usually have play to some degree. Even if it's not making noise right now, I'd still suggest dry park checking the steering linkage, and inspecting the ball joints for play.

Yes, they went quiet for about an hour again.. then started squeaking! Little bastards lol

Dry Park meaning? Just parked in my drive way? And how should I go about checking my steering linkage? Just get underthere and start trying to manhandle the front end for play? How would you man handle a ball joint in the control arm?

stylingpat wrote: Inner tie rods pretty easy to replace? The movotek (spelling?) ones are only $25 each on Rock Auto

You get what you pay for...:whistle:

Noah wrote:

stylingpat wrote: Inner tie rods pretty easy to replace? The movotek (spelling?) ones are only $25 each on Rock Auto

You get what you pay for...:whistle:

I was under the impression the movotek ones were the best seeing as they were the most expensive on there. How about a recommendation

Its probably a matter of opinion but most agree that Moog problem solver is the best line of chassis parts, don't be fooled by there cheap line of chinese moog

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I was actually kinda hoping you'd say they stayed quiet? :lol: I'd just start offering boot rotating services with oil changes.

A dry park check is the best way to inspect parallelogram steering linkages, IMO. With the vehicle at ride height (on the ground), have someone else shake the steering wheel while you inspect. The helper only needs to shake the play in the wheel, back and forth, back and forth. You're on the ground looking for axial or lateral play in the joints.

For ball joints, your short/long arm setup will require that you use a floor jack on the lower control arm to raise the wheel off the ground while still keeping the joints loaded. Get the biggest pry bar you own, put it under the tire, and pry up. Use one hand to pry, and the other on the tire to feel if/when the lower joint pops back and forth as you're prying.

Also use your hands at 6 and 12 o'clock to shake the tire, feeling for bearing play and potential upper joint lateral play.

Pumping grease in hides wear for a short while but when the truck is on the road the suspension moves and the free movemen due to wear forces the grease out.
One thing to watch is over greasing bursts the seals on the rod ends.

And the squeaking is gone! LOL. If betsy wants to go silent, its all good with me! LOL