Ford Bronco Breaks Tie Rod Out on the Trails, Gets Welded up on the Spot
A notorious weak spot on lifted, big tired Ford Bronco models leads to a nifty trail fix out in the desert.
While the sixth-generation Ford Bronco has been largely celebrated for its off-road capability, one particular weak spot has emerged on lifted models with larger tires – the tie rods, which is a couple of cases, have broken while out on the trails. The aftermarket has responded with beefier units and even tie rod reinforcers, but the owner of this particular Ford Bronco found out the hard way that such an upgrade can be necessary. Luckily, the good folks behind the YouTube channel Matt’s Off-Road Recovery were there to help when disaster struck.
After getting the call about the stranded Bronco, the team tried to call Ford to see if they could get a replacement tie rod, but as one might imagine in today’s world, that particular part is on a two-month backorder. Thus, they come up with a plan to cut up some pieces of pipe and weld everything back together in what they like to call a “trail fix.” Funny enough, their old recovery truck didn’t have enough juice to power their 24-volt welder, but luckily, another Ford Bronco comes along to help in that regard.
After cutting the bent tie rod, the crew then cuts some metal piping and fits it over that piece, using the winch to straighten up the wheel in the process. Once the newly sleeved tie rod is lined up as close to straight as they can get it, the welding begins. A few minutes later, the Bronco is able to emerge from its sticky situation unscathed and without assistance, which is pretty cool to see.
Obviously, this is no permanent solution and it was intended to simply allow the Bronco to get out of the desert so it could be towed home for a proper tie rod replacement. And that’s precisely what the owner did, sort of. In the comments, they noted that they didn’t just replace the stock tie rod, but rather, they also installed a set of BroncBuster’s tie-rod reinforcers so this sort of thing hopefully never happens again.
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