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AT4 levelling kit failure

19AT4
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19AT4 Enthusiast

19AT4

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Well I thought it wouldn’t happen to me, but my ball joint failed, collapsed the UCA and pulled my CV shaft out while on the highway. I highly recommend upgrading to new UCA’s with any levelling kit. I only had 12,000km’s with it installed. 
 

I would have bought them but the new UCA’s stick out further in which you can’t run the stock wheels without spacers if you get bigger tires. I have no interest in running spacers. 
 

Some food for thought... 

19AT4 Enthusiast

19AT4

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15 hours ago, dane0254 said:

Sorry to hear that. I hope all is well. What is your plan now?

 

It’s at the dealer, waiting to see what all needs to be replaced. I see that motofab offers a 1” level that doesn’t require the strut to be pulled apart for the spacer. I hate the factory rake. Plus I had 35x11.5’s on order which I had to cancel. 

chizzoy Enthusiast

chizzoy

Posted
Posted

i saw on youtube that AT4 or RSTs with factory 2” lifts require new ball joints if raising or leveling.   Saw it on youtube and they stressed that.  not sure if this relates to your situation.  https://youtu.be/X1Pt00h5R3I

ullose272 Enthusiast

ullose272

Posted
Posted

Doesnt really suprise me, if you are using a 2" level kit on a at4 or TB, it would be like basically putting a 4" lift on a standard truck, all those kits come with upper control arms.

Sent from my SM-G973U using Tapatalk

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Twotrack Enthusiast

Twotrack

Posted
Posted

Sorry this happened to you. I was on the fence about even installing the inch motofab kit I have because I’ve been debating just holding out and doing the icon or mazzula kit with control arms and fox or kings. I think I’ll just hold out and only do it once now. 

19AT4 Enthusiast

19AT4

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21 hours ago, KillerOfMillers said:

What level kit did you use?

 

2” rough county, I called them about the failure. They said there’s no way their kit could have caused that, especially because my truck only sees highway driving. They blamed the shop that installed it. 
 

GM got back to me this morning with a bill of $1800 to get it all fixed. They said it was caused from the added stress but the mechanic said to use leveling kits that put spacers below the struts. He said you’ll be perfectly fine with that. 

  • Like 1
19AT4 Enthusiast

19AT4

Posted
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Posted
21 hours ago, ullose272 said:

Doesnt really suprise me, if you are using a 2" level kit on a at4 or TB, it would be like basically putting a 4" lift on a standard truck, all those kits come with upper control arms.

Sent from my SM-G973U using Tapatalk
 

 

There must be more than the eye can see, the CV angles were great with this level. That was one of my worries when I got the kit back in Jan. 

112379B5-2A3A-4E46-9AFB-74EDB3D03CA2.jpeg

KillerOfMillers Enthusiast

KillerOfMillers

Posted
Posted
2 hours ago, 19AT4 said:

2” rough county, I called them about the failure. They said there’s no way their kit could have caused that, especially because my truck only sees highway driving. They blamed the shop that installed it. 
 

GM got back to me this morning with a bill of $1800 to get it all fixed. They said it was caused from the added stress but the mechanic said to use leveling kits that put spacers below the struts. He said you’ll be perfectly fine with that. 

What exactly are they claiming was installed incorrectly by the shop?  It's funny how RoughCountry's 3.5" lift comes with upper control arms, but they're 2" level specifically for TB/AT4 which would stretch lift to 4" doesn't.  

 

This is the second time in the past couple weeks that I have heard of an upper balljoint failure.  Not gonna lie, driving to work this morning I thought about it and it made me nervous.  I didn't go the spacer route for my level, I used FabTech 3.5" coilovers and upper control arms, but I'm still uneasy. 

19AT4 Enthusiast

19AT4

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2 hours ago, KillerOfMillers said:

What exactly are they claiming was installed incorrectly by the shop?  It's funny how RoughCountry's 3.5" lift comes with upper control arms, but they're 2" level specifically for TB/AT4 which would stretch lift to 4" doesn't.  

 

This is the second time in the past couple weeks that I have heard of an upper balljoint failure.  Not gonna lie, driving to work this morning I thought about it and it made me nervous.  I didn't go the spacer route for my level, I used FabTech 3.5" coilovers and upper control arms, but I'm still uneasy. 

I don’t think they torqued the bolts properly when they had it all apart. I called rough country about it and they said there’s no way it should have came apart like it did. Especially considering all of the trucks miles are highway. I’m not sure what all’s different between the AT4 and non AT4 models but I know they got the extra 2” from longer struts. The angles all looked fine with the 2” level. 

19AT4 Enthusiast

19AT4

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Just now, 19AT4 said:

I don’t think they torqued the bolts properly when they had it all apart. I called rough country about it and they said there’s no way it should have came apart like it did. Especially considering all of the trucks miles are highway. I’m not sure what all’s different between the AT4 and non AT4 models but I know they got the extra 2” from longer struts. The angles all looked fine with the 2” level. 

Plus I put the truck on a jack and tested to see how the ball joints were. I was a bit worried from other horror stories I read. There was zero play. 

  • 3 months later...
JNG155 New Member

JNG155

Posted
Posted

I just had a ball joint failure on my 2019 AT4 yesterday with a Rough Country 2” levelling  kit.  65mph on the highway.  Almost had a head on crash.

ZDAT4 Enthusiast

ZDAT4

Posted
Posted

Prob not a mechanic, most likely the kit caused too much stress on the ball joint. The bad angles prob snapped your ball joint

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