Control arm, ball joint or bushing failure on the 2001 Dodge Dakota
4 crashes 1 injury 5 of the 240 reports for this failure mention a crash, a fire, an injury or a death. Those are the owner's words on the complaint form, not a verified finding, and one report can mention more than one.
When control arm, ball joint or bushing failure gets reported
Owners of the 2001 Dodge Dakota report control arm, ball joint or bushing failure at a median of 44,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 33,000 miles and a quarter after 60,000 miles, from 176 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 108,000 miles. It is the 1st most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 21,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 71,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 49,662 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
Reports bunched into a band this tight usually mean the component has a life of its own: it goes at roughly the same mileage regardless of who owns it.
31% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 21,000 miles | 33,000 miles | 44,490 miles | 60,000 miles | 70,662 miles |
Read the 10th percentile as “one report in ten arrived this early”. Exact figures are shown in this table because it is the table of record; everywhere else on the site they are rounded to the precision the sample can carry.
What a percentile can and cannot tell you here
These five numbers describe the readings owners gave, in order. The median is the middle one: half the reports arrived below it. The 10th and 90th are the edges of the bulk of the distribution, and the distance between them is the part worth reading. A tight spread — say 70,000 to 95,000 miles — points at something that wears out on a schedule, and the schedule is knowable. A wide one, 20,000 to 190,000, points at a fault that hits some cars and never troubles others, which means the mileage on the listing in front of you tells you very little about your odds.
What these figures are not is a survival curve. Every reading here comes from a car whose owner filed a complaint, so the sample contains only failures: it cannot say what share of the fleet made it past 150,000 miles untouched, because those owners had nothing to report. Nor is the mileage the moment of failure — it is the odometer reading as recalled at the time of filing, which may be weeks later and is sometimes rounded to the nearest ten thousand by the person typing it.
Percentiles are shown at all only once 8 readings exist for the vehicle and mode. Below that the middle of a handful of numbers is noise wearing a decimal point, so the figures are withheld rather than dressed up.
What happens, and what it costs
Of these reports, 4 a crash and 1 an injury are mentioned. Owners write their own complaints and the agency does not verify them, so read this as what the reports say happened rather than as a confirmed count.
Putting it right typically runs $400–$2,200 at an independent US shop. That range is an editorial estimate held in this site's failure-mode catalogue, not a figure from NHTSA, and it is a repair cost rather than a diagnosis cost.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 11 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2003, at a median of 30,000 miles, and latest on the 2006 at 65,000 miles.
By volume the 1999 carries the most reports, with 399; the 2001 has 240. A mode that appears across most years of a model is usually a design choice rather than a bad batch.
If one year stands out to the left, that is the year to avoid; if the whole line sits at a similar mileage, this is wear rather than a defect in one production run.
Tick median reported mileage Solid middle half of reports Faint 10th to 90th percentile Colour how bad the failure is when it happens
What owners wrote
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.
Excessive ball joint wear. My wife (stephanie ball) filed a complaint back in 1999 for the same problem. I think his name was steve from NHTSA contacted us and keep us informed of the problem. She has had the ball joints replaced five times in her dakota. The last contact from NHTSA was that they was going to make dodge recall these vehicles for this dangerous problem. It has been two years and we have not heard any more on this issue. I help by getting names of other people that was having the same problem. I manage an auto parts store a auto of madison wv and this is not just an isolated problem. I know of 4 dakota that were wrecked and sustained severe damage due to ball joint failure. The adjuster from state farm's mother had a wreck due to ball joint failure. And he said that he had seen several that had wrecked. I could replace these ball joints with aftermarket moog brand and solve the problem. But it shouldn't be up to me to solve it. I would have thought after the firestone episode that issues like this would be taken more seriously. I contacted the dealer today because you have to check the ball joints every couple of…
My balljoints snapped while turning in my sons school one morning , resulting in my front wheel and brake assembly falling off completely from my 2001 dodge dakota 4x4 truck in december 2002. I had 1000 miles passed factory warrenty
My balljoints snapped while turning in my sons school one morning , resulting in my front wheel and brake assembly falling off completely from my 2001 dodge dakota 4x4 truck in december 2002. I had 1000 miles passed factory warrenty
Also reported on the 2001 Dodge Dakota
Premature brake pad or rotor wear
Other powertrain problem
Other engine problem
Steering rack, gear or tie rod failure
Other brake problem
Other wheel or tire problem
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 240 is a floor and not a count of affected cars. Mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers. And the mode itself is assigned by software reading the complaint text, which is reliable in bulk and fallible one report at a time.
Questions this page answers
At what mileage does control arm, ball joint or bushing failure happen on the 2001 Dodge Dakota?
Across 176 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 44,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 33,000 miles and a quarter after 60,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is control arm, ball joint or bushing failure on the 2001 Dodge Dakota?
240 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 2.3 per 1,000 vehicles. Complaints are voluntary, so this is a floor rather than a count of affected cars.
What this is and is not. These are the mileages at which owners chose to complain to a federal agency, which is not the same as the mileage at which the part fails on every car. It skews toward failures that happened outside warranty, cost real money, or frightened someone. It is still the only public dataset that carries failure mileage at all, and the shape of a few hundred readings is informative even when a single one is not. Methodology · JSON · this failure on other cars
Source Owner complaints and recall records published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, model years 1996–2027 Figures rebuilt Published by AtWhatMileage How every figure is computed