Failed tie rod ends

[Louis_Young]

Has anyone experienced early failure of tie rod ends? I have a 2001 2500HD CC Short bed 4X4 Duramax/Allison truck with 54,000 miles. I just replace the original equipment tire and when getting the front end realigned I discovered the outer and inner tie rod ends are worn so much they can't be properly adjusted. Any information would be greatly appreciated.

[Paintdude]

I wonder if the loose steering box gears have anything to do with it?? If the gear is loose the tires would be moving all the time going down the road..Multiplying the wear..

Just a thought..

[TLA]

At 80K miles, my '97 3500 is on its 3rd set. 2nd set was NAPA, this set OEM. Seems a real weak link.

[TC]

I had my truck aligned at about 37,000 miles and the tech reported the linkage on the right side was very worn. It was marginal on needing to be replaced so I just left it alone for a while.

The truck has been greased regularly. No particular reason for it to wear so soon.

[Blacktruck-1]

Had my truck in for a popping noise when I backed up with the wheels cut hard. Two wheel drive so that leaves out CV joints. The official fix was a "stop" needed a little grease. Well the noise went away for a few weeks and came back--louder this time! Crawled under it myself and decided to give the zerks a little grease and found both the idler arm and pitman arm to have what I would call excessive play. Tie rod ends were tight. Left tire showed some inside cupping. Shot some grease in em and the popping stopped. Havn't had a chance to take it back to the dealer yet.

[TopBanana 2500]

Blacktruck...
I have the same thing you had. I've got 29,000 mi on mine. I guess I should grease the zirks now. Let me know what the dealer says! Thanks