Inspecting my front suspension today and noticed that these looked very beat up. I don't have any front end clunks. I'm looking for a sense of urgency on how bad these are, and if it is an easy enough DIY job. I know I'll probably need an alignment after this would be done

 

Not terribly difficult, but a few other things need to be moved in the engine compartment to access the upper mounting nuts.

 

If there's no play in the ball joint why not just buy a pair of new boots. Clean up the joint, smear some grease in, and put the new boots on. Check first, though, to make sure the joint moves smoothly. If the joint is just left it will eventually start to seize and then could snap on you on the highway at speed, so not something to ignore. Here in the UK those joints would fail our roadworthyness test ("MOT")

 

How to I properly test these for play? Sorry if it's a stupid question, I've only started working on my own cars for a year or two. I tried shaking the wheels when they were lifted, and there is no play in either horizontal or vertical directions. All of the lower control bushings, sway bar, and other rubber bits are in great condition.

 

What on earth is a ball joint bushing? Do you mean the ball joints, or the bushings?

 

See my picture. It looks like a bushing below the ball joint on the upper control arms. Maybe it is a dust shield? I don't know exactly what to call it but whatever it is, mine are greatly deteriorated.

 

The upper wishbone has one steel ball joint and two trunnion bushes. The photo shows the balljoint with its protecting rubber boot, but these are split thus allowed dust/grit/salty water into the joint. Over time this will wear out the joint and also cause corrosion. Eventually the corrosion/wear results in difficulty in movement and the possibility of the securing shank of the joint snapping. The wheel has then lost all security of fitting and an accident is likely as the wheel can now move anywhere. I have seen a snapped lower ball joint on a jeep-like vehicle in my village. The owner told me it had been squeaking a while and the following week he was going to take it to a shop. Fortunately he was only doing a very slow speed when it snapped, so no accident, he just stopped at the roadside.
Other thing to say is that things like this are normally picked up when a vehicle is inspected by a mechanic during normal servicing.

 

Just a heads up as all Jaguars will have this. I did replace them in the past but as was recommended up thread unless I have noise or clunking I leave them alone.
I am surprised that you don't have split boots on the sway bar end links as well and on the rear suspension?

Those upper control arms on the drivers front are VERY difficult to change. The rear upper A arm bushing bolt is almost impossible to get at without removing a bunch of extra stuff.
I think that's the side shown in your pictures?

The upper ball joint is unlikely to break. The way the suspension is designed the lower ball joint takes all the weight and most of the wear and tear on the front end.
If fact I don't think I have ever seen an upper ball joint let go but I have rode a busted lower ball joint into the ground on my old 1959 Thunderbird. Lucky I was going only 20 mph or so.

Also the upper control arms have been the same for decades and they are still identical to my old 2003 Lincoln LS.
So the parts cost should not be too high.
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That's variously called a gaiter, or a boot. It keeps grease in, and water/grit/dust out. It doesn't have any load carrying duty.

Bushings usually refers to the rubber parts at the inside of the control arms, and in other places, which transmit suspension forces, allow movement, and do some absorption of vibration.

 

Thanks for the helpful info. I did not check the rear suspension as I was only under the front, diagnosing a vacuum pump oil leak I have. All of the external bits on the sway bar links looked good.

 

In my world a gaitor is the partial tire tread thrown from a truck recap tire in the road.

 

This may not be true for the X351 like it was for the X350. I was just researching the upper control arms and found no crossover between X351 and X350/Stype/Lincoln LS. A lot of the X351 suspension looks the same but there are slight differences. For example, I was convinced the banana shaped control arm would be the same but when I went to change it I found that the X351 version was cast at a different angle and was a bit thicker. You could not use the old version. So while the upper arms may appear the same at first look, I suspect the angles are probably different to accommodate the unique body of the X351.

 

Also, some of the control arms are different, on AWD vs. non-AWD.

 

My car, the pics you are looking at, is RWD, and pictures of both driver and passenger side

 

Thanks for posting that and the part numbers are different. But they are so close?

Looking at the pictures it seems the early arm is for the Lincoln LS/Jaguar/Thunderbird and is marked Jaguar 9479-A. Here is a Motorcraft part #MCSOE-38.
You can barely make out the 9479 after the Jaguar on the arm.




Hard to see.




The later Jaguar XJ is labeled Jaguar 9478-A. Jaguar part #C2D2475.



Can't see the markings very well.




So I think your right but it would be interesting to see what they changed because it 's not much!
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Nice work, club!

Just a quick note: C2D2475 has been superseeded by C2D36804/6

wombat

 

Thanks much for the updated part number!
I wanted to post the correct info and I was wrong about those arms not changing and wanted to see exactly what the difference is?
Still not sure but we are sure they are different so you can't interchange them. That was the important finding.
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I got mine changed under extended warranty, as dealer won't replace boots. About 4k all in that it saved me.
Without it, I would have just waited until noise persisted.

 

I too have a perished boot on the front nearside (UK) upper wishbone on my 2013 XF. The question I had is what size are the boots in this location? There are loads of threads everywhere discussing replacing the boots but nowhere (that I could find) reliably has the size.
I have already replaced the offside upper wishbone because of an MOT failure a couple of years ago. (that was a real pain because of the difficulty getting to all the stuff that has to be removed to get to the wishbone mounting bolts at the top of the shock absorber tower) so i wanted to avoid replacing the nearside wishbone. I was able to quickly remove the perished boot and the 2 boot retaining rings - I was then able to measure and order the replacement boot. The size is 30mm x 16mm - I ordered boot 4 from Rikfit ( which they call "track control arm boots") I will post again if they DONT fit since at the moment I'm waiting for delivery. Hope this helps someone so that they dont have the car off the road while they are waiting after disassembling the suspension.