I have a loud squeak coming from the front passenger side wheel well on my 99 Chevy blazer ls 4wd. (See attached video) I just replaced the shocks all the way around. It greatly improved the handling and cornering but I was hoping it would fix the squeak. It squeaks with bumps and not the speed of the wheel if that makes sense. Anyone had this problem? How would yall diagnose this problem?

Edit*** I suspect its the lower ball joint. it passed the slop test. The lower ball joint boot was busted and it would not take grease through the zerk fitting. I peeled back the boot and put grease straight in there the best i could. I also had somebody rock the car and I felt around for what felt like a sqeak and i think it was coming from something on the lower half. Is that enough evidence for it to be the lower ball joint or am i wrong? Also if you are stopped in the driveway and turn the wheel it will also sqeak. Even is the lower ball joint isn’t the solution is it worth replacing it anyway with the boot being busted?

 

Have you checked the ball joints and control atm bushings?

 

that is what I was going to check. I figured I would make a post on here just asking about it. How do you check them? Just visually inspect them and make sure they have grease?

 

To start with, jack up the front end and to a slop test by grabbing the tires and try to move them to see if there is any looseness. Also do a visual inspection of the upper and lower control arm bushings. And then add grease to all the ball joints. If the noise goes away, then you know you have a bad one. You might try greasing each one at a time and then doing a check to help isolate the bad one, if that is the problem.

 

it passed the slop test. The lower ball joint boot was busted and it would not take grease through the zerk fitting. I peeled back the boot and put grease straight in there the best i could. I also had somebody rock the car and I felt around for what felt like a sqeak and i think it was coming from something on the lower half. Is that enough evidence for it to be the lower ball joint or am i wrong?

 

So if one of the lower ball joints has a torn boot and cannot be greased, you should definitely replace both lower ball joints even if they were not responsible for the squeak. Was the one with the torn boot visibly dry without any grease or did it still look as if it was lubricated? It is easy to imagine that being the source of the squeak if it was without grease.

BTW, I've attached my scans of how to do the GM recommended tests for the much of the front suspension. Looking it over, I was reminded of its procedure for checking the play in the lower ball joints using a prybar. The amount of allowed deflection is pretty small for the ball joints. Through the process of elimination, it can be determined if it is an upper or lower ball joint that is loose.

Can you add grease to the upper ball joints? You did say you thought the noise was coming from lower in the suspension so perhaps the upper ball joints are not the culprit. That said, the upper ball joints are likely the same age as the lower ones and it might be a good idea to just replace all four of them while you are at it.

Now, even though we've worked out that at the minimum the lower ball joints should be replaced, it still might be the bushings on the control arms causing the squeak. I couldn't find anything in the service manual for how to check those. What I would try is to spray WD-40 on each bushing on each of the upper and lower control arms one at a time, and after each bushing us sprayed do the bounce test. If the squeak goes away, then the last bushing you sprayed would be at least one of the culprits. Note that there could be more than one bad bushing. If one bushing is bad on a control arm, then both pairs on each side should be replaced. Again, if any of them are bad on the upper or lower control arms, you might consider replacing them all anyway.

Finally, the cost of replacing the bushings and ball joints might be more than just replacing the upper and lower control arms that come with new ball joints and bushings. Of course you could just jump to a full front end rebuild but if you are like me, I prefer to know as much as I can before I start throwing parts at a problem.

Does all this make sense?