reminds me of my 2001 dodge truck i had that was only month or two old i took it down and had the muffler and converter cut off ( i know was supposed to be illegal to do that)and 2 flow masters put on and on my way home i stopped and filled it with gas and then went by where my wife worked and dropped it off and got her caravan to go fill it up and went home with it,,,,well when she came in the house after work ( she was late getting home) she was hollering there is something bad wrong with the truck so i only drove 25mph to get home LOL a 10 minute drive took her almost an hour,,, she didnt think was as funny as i did tho.....
Just finished a front suspension overhaul on my wife's 2016 Dodge Journey R/T AWD (3-row). It was hell. We changed both front struts, both ball joints, both sway bar links, both body bushings, and the driver side wheel bearing (passenger side went bad last year, early failure, so I decided to just go for it "while we were in there"). My wife helped some on the wrenching and passed me tools so my fat ass didn't have to do the up-down shuffle a million times. Here's what we learned . . .
(BTW - this is not the exact order of operations, that can be pretty fluid depending on what your total replacement scope includes).
Ball Joints (This is First for a Reason)
Mopar knuckle design sucks hairy taint. Took combined adapters from 3 tool sets (two rented, one bought) to get them out and back into the knuckle. Getting them out took receiving cups from the two Powerbuilt kits carried by Advance Auto (one big, 23 pieces, and one small, 10-14 pieces I think, don't remember. The small kit is model 04057# (the # is either a 9 or an 8, can't tell from the one blurry photo it's in on my phone). The removal also required one of the forcing blanks from the big kit (basically a circular metal slug that gives the C-clamp extra push thru the knuckle bore to finish the extraction. Speaking of the C-clamp, the big beefy one that MOST auto parts stores carry in their rental kits (it's identical between the big and small Powerbuilt kits) will NOT finish the removal. For that I needed a regular 8" C-clamp (pictured with the green quick release button). The forcing knuckle on the Powerbuilt kit C-clamp is TOO BIG to fit into the recess of the steering knuckle on the car with the forcing blank, and the screw-drive knuckle can't be made to align to push it out with the C-clamp reversed (tried, and failed, YMMV).
However, I used the C-clamp from the kit, along with a stack of receiving adapters, to get the ball joint most of the way out, and then switched to my 8" C-clamp (continuing to use the receiving adapters) to finish the removal. I will say that removing the snap-ring from the ball joint (prior to extraction) was a sinch. Use a thin but sturdy punch and a hammer (of whatever kind, doesn't need to be huge), and soak the snap-ring and groove in Kroil or PB Blaster about 5 minutes before you go at it. Took me all of 2 minutes per side, including sitting my ass down and gathering the tools. You'll need to remove the brake rotor and dust shield to get at the clip thru the little slot in the knuckle below the hub, but you MIGHT be able to grip it with locking pliers and just yank it off from the inboard side of the knuckle - I have my doubts, but it could be possible. To remove the taper spindle of the ball joint from the end of the lower control arm, you can use heat and a hammer (heat and hit the control arm end itself to shock the taper bore apart from the taper spindle), or use a puller. I used a small puller that's really meant for built-in ball joints and tie rod ends, but I used to to put tension on the taper spindle and then hammered the control arm end until it shocked the tapers apart with a loud bang. Either way you do it, that's how you know it worked. Make sure to remove the nut first (I almost forgot).
Installation was a crap show. For this, you have basically three options Option one, use the C-clamp from the Powerbuilt kit, with installation cup adapters, to force the ball joint about 60% of the way in, and then hammer it the rest of the way. 5/10, would not recommend if I were you. If you HAVE to resort to this method, use a SOFT HAMMER - rubber mallet or deadblow hammer, not a hard steel hammer. Go slow, and use a little grease in the bore (just a little). If you lift the car high enough, you can do this all on the car. The reason you need to finish with a hammer is that the Powerbuilt kit C-clamps (which are identical to the kits used by Autozone and ORiellys) cannot fit into the knuckle with a receiving cup, and the ball joint sticks through the interior of the knuckle about 1cm when fully seated, which means you NEED the receiving cup to give it space to fit. Option two would be to remove the knuckle entirely and put it in a jig, in a shop press (need at least 15" of clearance), and press the ball joint in that way. You'll need the jig to hold the knuckle straight, and installation cups to press on the rim around the ball joint to seat it. Option 3, buy the Mopar ball joint C-clamp kit for $500.
Just kidding. The REAL OPTION 3, which is what I did, was to find an aftermarket kit that emulates the Mopar kit, and use that. The kit that I bought (okay, actually my wife bought it after I sent her out to find the right kit once both Powerbuilt rental kits had failed) has a wide, open ended forcing knuckle that is juuuuuust big enough to accept the butt end of the ball joint as it comes into the knuckle. The only issue is the kit didn't come with the correct installation cup adapters (for the tapered end of the ball joint), so I used the ones from the Powerbuilt kits that I'd rented. Ideally, you could buy this kit (pics included below), along with a set of adapter cups/tubes, and you'd be set. The kit was about $130, and you can get adapter cup sets for cheap - sometimes as low as $30 or $40. The aftermarket, Mopar-lite kit that I used for ball joint installation is #40920 by Specialty Products Corp, and my wife tracked it down at O'Reilly's Auto Parts. Nobody else, that we can tell, carries it. Oh, and finally, installing the snap ring once you're done is a breeze. I was able to do it by hand, no tools or tapping required. You can either just push it right into the groove from behind, or get one end in and work the rest into the groove along it's circumference.
Wheel Bearing
This was my second front wheel bearing/hub job on the Journey. Both were a huge PITA. The bearings on ours were super-seized and resisted all attempts by slide-hammer to extract. I used both my own 5-lb slide hammer (which has successfully removed bearing/hub combos from other vehicles with no heat and only minor lubrication), and an 8-lb rented slide hammer. Neither worked. What ended up working was copious Kroil application, MAP/PRO heat (out of the yellow bottle), and a 5-lb sledge working from one back edge of the hub to the other, alternating sides and working it out. Even to get it started took about 20 minutes of effort (some of that with the slide hammers, which as noted did not budge the thing at all), and getting it out took another 10. I will say I was being reserved because this was towards the beginning of what promised to be a long job, but just go in expecting to fight. I also used a punch and chisel at times to encourage separation - this is fine, and does not damage the mating surface of the knuckle. I had the bright idea to see if I could get the bearing to spin in the knuckle first, before attempting to pull, but this did not work. Maybe I could have hit it harder to try spinning it, but I don't know. All I know is get yourself a 5-lb mini sledge if you go at this job, because if you're using a slide hammer and it's not working, with every strike you're also damaging the hub, so you won't wanna be driving on it until the new hub is installed.
Speaking of, make sure you clean the bore thoroughly before installing the new bearing/hub. There is a small sealing shim ring that goes between the hub and the splined drive spindle, don't forget about that It'll fall of or otherwise make itself known once you've gotten the old hub out. I put the bearing into the (cleaned and lightly greased) knuckle bore as far as I could by hand, which was about 8 or so millimeters (make sure to keep the drive spindle aligned with the splined interior hole or it can bind, forcing you to pull back out and restart). From there, I used the bolts to draw the mating surfaces of the hub and knuckle together, a little at a time, using all 4 bolts in a criss-cross pattern (think of lug nut tightening). Unless you remove the knuckle entirely and put it on a press, this is the only viable solution. Using bolts to draw surfaces together and pull a press-fit is a time-honored hack tradition, and guess what folks - it works. Go slow, alternate bolts, pre-apply LocTite, and you'll be FINE. If you insist on being a perfectionist, have 4 new bolts on hand and swap 'em out once the unit is pressed together. Or you can be a man and roll with it. The TIGHTENING torque of the bolts is WAY higher than the torques it took to get the surfaces mated as a unit, so I am not worried in the slightest about bolt stretch. I know it's a real thing, but it doesn't apply here.
Body Bushings
The sway bar body bushings were easy, but still a PITA because of the tight spaces involved. Luckily I had a set of offset box-end wrenches, and pass-thru sockets, that worked great for the passenger side. Driver side was accessible with a flex-head ratchet all around, but other methods exist. For the rear bolt on the passenger side bushing bracket, get ready to spend a good twenty minutes on the ground, going 12.5 degrees at a time on a bolt that will seem absurdly long by the time you're through. The heat/debris shield for the steering gear kinda-sorta extends over the bushing bracket and limits your hand space. My hands are medium sized, and I had almost no room to use my fingers once the bolt was loose enough to make it possible. My wife attempted to go at it from under the car, the inboard side, but that didn't pan out. I do think the right combo of attachments on a ratchet might have made that method possible, and I do have a full set of u-joint extensions, but I don't like them much and didn't bother getting them out. If they work for you and are less of a pain than slowly inching a bolt out one eighth of a turn at a time, then congrats and I'm happy for you.
Sway Bar End Links
These suck. They just suck. Broke two star bit heads in the spindle ends trying to hold the ball-joints stationary while spinning the nuts off. Ended up needing to use an 18mm open end on the joint-side flats while using a socket to spin the nut off the spindle end. It's a simple process but it sucks because of the rust and the "forced-round" nuts that these components use (the hole in the nut is slightly oval and is forced into a circular shape by the spindle on the end of the ball-joint. The new ones come the same way, so get ready for the same fun - in R-E-V-E-R-S-E!!! We saved this for last, and my arms and hands were toast afterwards.
Struts
Easiest part of the job. The strut-to-knuckle nuts are tight and rusty, but you've got all the space in the world to use a long-handle and get supreme leverage. Make sure to mark the bolt heads (not the nuts) of the bolts so you know how they go back in for the best alignment. You WILL NEED TO GET AN ALIGNMENT after doing this job, but if you can get it close on reassembly you can wait a couple days - its not super urgent. We used a simple vertical line with dots to mark the top of the line, and extra markings for the bolt that goes on top (it matters). Aside from that, just make sure to keep the speed sensor cables and brake hose out of the way when you're removing and installing, and you're golden. You do have to remove BOTH plastic cowls, both front wiper arms, and a steel crossmember in the engine compartment to properly get at and torque the topside nuts holding the strut to the body, but that's easy - just take pictures and keep the plastic rivets organized so you know where they go back. We did have a minor fight with the wiper arms, but we used a tie-rod puller (pictured) to get them off and it worked great. That is the same puller I used on the ball joint taper spindle, mentioned in the first section. It is a common tool and can be had for like $15-30 on Amazon or Ebay.
Okay, my hands hurt too much to keep typing. Forgive any typos, they're also shaky from yesterday's effort. Hope this helps someone. Next spring we'll be replacing both front lower control arms, so there may be more coming.
lol it runs smooth it’s just that knocking. I pulled the coils today and they look and smell pretty burnt. The connectors even look like they got way too hot. Plugs even look and smell the same.
1-2 hours to replace your battery?? I changed mine (twice now) on my 09 Journey in 30-40 mins. If it took you 2 hours you stopped for a beer. All my Jeep forum does is bitch how fast the batteries in Cherokees are ruined by heat under the hood. You get about 3 years out of a battery. And really, who looks at where the battery is when they are car shopping! First world problems.....
Well we've only had the car on the road for a week, and 600 road miles but I must say I'M IMPRESSED with it !
I come from a long background (25 yrs.) of driving Dodge/Chrys. minivans, along with other vehicles. ALL of which I maintain on my own from a LONG background in automotive repair. YES there are some things I no longer have the equipment to be able to do certain tasks, but have good knowledge of how to do, so here goes with my comments.....
This Journey was found and purchased mainly due to price and that it has NO RUST, YES it's got high mileage at 189k miles. Paint is in typical MOPAR fashion of small paint chipping on the hood and some clear coat "whitening" on the front of the roof above the windshield ...We can "live" with that. I'm "all in" cost wise for $4k, with new brakes/rotors ALL fluids and filters done, new plugs and coils and the "biggie" that it needed the trans solenoid pack replaced( a common issue with the 6 speed).
We live out in the country, so most roads are NOT "highway" smooth. Ride quality in this car is phenomenal! Absolutely QUIET ride with NO clunks/rattles.
Interior...well not trashed by age, still looks very nice with some seat trim plastic cracks. Capacity for adult passengers, I would say maxes out to 4 people as the 3rd row is practically useless for adults to get to. But lots of room with seat down for shopping purchases or "outing" cargo. NOT as much interior room as my many minivans, but a totally different "class" of vehicle.
Drivetrain...Well we've got some learning to do on habits of AWD, as we've never had one before. This may be the concern of "shifting" feel when making turns at intersections.
Now comes the "disclaimer"...
Got this car as a replacement for my collage age son's NEON that he has been driving for 5 years. He's a drummer with a very large "kit" that he hauls around frequently. The Neon could fit most of needed pieces, but could not take even a RF passenger. This car will easily fit his needs AND help him with a good looking "all around" vehicle for when he takes his "independence" from home after finishing college. Of course he is "all in" in liking this Journey, as it's his Fav color and audio system suits him without needing any "upgrading"..and it beats being seen driving a mini van!
I'm sure this Journey will be a "keeper" in the family "stable" for a long time!
Its always good to hear about a high miles vehicle finding a good home. So often they are bought for beaters and driven like throw-away towels. For many years while my kids were growing up, a Mopar minivan was a staple for our brood. It was truly the most versatile, utilitarian and easy on the wallet at the gas pump than so many other choices. We didn't do any towing so that was never a factor but we haul plenty of kids, band gear, crafts and home items than you could shake a stick at. Just one more reason I think I feel a kindred spirit when I drive a Journey. As far as the drivetrain, my 3.6 powered 200S is a hoot to drive and it still delivers great mpg despite my heavy foot. I'm sure the 3.6 AWD will be a bit less frugal but I'm prepared for that reality. Good luck with your DJ and long may she roll!
As pointed out; Sorry to have to tell you, but that is NOT the OEM camera - unfortunately LOTS of Chinese providers claim OEM status for their junk - this is just another one of them.
There are several threads on this board and a number of videos on Youtube describing what's necessary to upgrade to the 8.4" display.
In summary, you will need to replace the TGM (radio module) with the RE2 or RB5 (if you want Navigation). If you don't have Sirius now you'll need to add the satellite antenna and related cable to enable that and/or the navigation.
The profile of the 8.4 is a bit different from the 4.3 and you'll need to replace all of the bezels for the center stack.
If you don't have auto-air now you need to add or replace the temperature sensor (that ball in the center of the dash top) and add the wire for it.
You'll need to unlock your new TGM, add the sales code for the backup camera and possibly for automatic air conditioning as well - if you don't the screen controls for temperature won't work.
Having said all this, as of 2018 all vehicles have backup cameras - yours must be earlier production; I have no idea what might be involved in upgrading the system to support the camera on the 4.3" platform, but it is likely to be a lot less expensive than doing the 8.4" conversion.
I just changed mine because it broke. I bought the replacement off of amazon for 14 dollars.
They said it was OEM, but it wasn't. Didn't matter- works great.
Someone else said once that the shark fin was weak, and the short nubby antenna was also weak.
I don't know- everytime i removed mine for hauling using the roof rail, the radio worked equal to when it was installed.
thats what i did today:
reinstalled factory storage from my seven seater
build a wooden frame
two boxes for my gear
lid on top with latches
carpet on top
This is work in progress.
After searching everywhere on the net there isnt much available.
Hence getting a custom rear diffuser to accompdate a double twin pipe for the DJ.
Since it is a SUV I didnt want to be too different than the original dif yet a bit more sporty.
Got some ideas I got from the C63 AMG in the attached pix. Please comments for something similar?
Well, I finally upgraded my 2014 SXT. I took out the 4.3s and installed the RE2 receiver, the 8.4" screen, the new bezel, and the lower stack. I also installed the factory backup camera as well.
The receiver, screen, lower stack, and bezel were pretty straightforward and easy to install. '14 Charger receiver, '13 Journey screen, '14 Journey bezel, and '11? I think, lower stack. I included some pictures below of some things I hadn't seen others include as far as how to remove the trim and whatnot. My wife and I really enjoy the upgrade, makes the interior feel much less "base package" and more complete. I, like others, haven't fixed the temperature controls on the screen but I haven't given up yet. I've talked with guys from my dealer and realized they're not going to be much help as this is the first radio they have even unlocked. Thanks to this forum I had more information than they did. I've talked with Uconnect who did not have info for me, and talked with Dodge corporate and they referred me to a larger dealer in the area but I haven't gotten a hold of them yet.
I played with the controls and found that when I "sync" the temps, the front and back hvac behave as one. That's nice as we have small kids in the back. If the knobs in the back are turned then the sync is broken and the rear acts independently. It also seems that even though the sliders on the climate screen maintain the nefarious "22 degrees" mark, if you slide them up or down it seems to lock that temperature in even though the slider moves back to the middle a few seconds later. The satellite radio still worked fine, so the free subscription apparently didn't get kicked back.
The dealer charged me for 1 hour labor for the combined unlock code and flashing the backup camera. Like I said above, this was the first one they've done. I had all the info they needed (even though they didn't know they needed it) thanks to this forum.
I bought the backup camera from the dealer (they were able to have it the next day). It came with detailed instructions that, at times, were not completely accurate as it was written in 2011. It was pretty involved to install - let's say it's not for the faint of heart. I took some pictures of that process that I've included below as well. You really do have to remove quite a bit of trim and one of the rear seats (If you have the third row). It's definitely doable if you're handy though, and I learned a lot about the car while doing it. I fished the wires a couple of times so that is one thing I would recommend if you're planning on doing it. My wife and I REALLY enjoy having it. The blind spot behind the car is especially bad without the camera if you have a car seat in the third row.
I couldn't figure out how to insert larger pictures....
