CV Joints for the Dummy Driver

CV joint of front-wheel drive vehicle

It's been called to our attention that we've been "picking on" eHow during Cars Week, and it's true that Dumbasses one through five are all eHowians. Our researchers whine that Suite seems to be offline permanently, Seekyt has no useful search function, and HubPages "hides" anything that doesn't meet their alleged standards. That pretty much leaves eHow, now that Helium and AssociatedContent are dead. The researchers did, however, grudgingly dig through the hubbies' output for a couple of entries; starting with Amanda Carter (BizGenGirl, next claiming to be named Bema Self, more recently CapriCookie, and [this week] PermissionGiver) who published something she called "How to Tell if Your CV Joints Need to Be Replaced" at good ol' HubPages.com...

We won't lie: it irritates the hell out of us to see those eHow automotive "help" articles that open by telling readers what Toyota first built a 4Runner or Ford sold a Ranger. On the other hand, we sincerely believe that an automotive technoboob would probably benefit from at least a rudimentary definition of a CV Joint. Amanda, however, apparently doesn't think so. All she has to say on the topic is that

"...most of our current vehicles fly down the roads on what is known as Constant Velocity Axels, or CV Axels. [sic] They were designed to make the vehicle faster, smoother and better on gas, which they do fairly well when they are in good condition..."

May we say, Amanda, that's just plain old dumbassery? A constant-velocity joint has a very specific purpose: it allows transmission of torque to the drive wheels whether or not they are moving at the same speed (e.g., inner vs. outer wheel on a turn) or have the same angle relative to horizontal. That's a lot more specific than just "...make the vehicle faster, smoother and better on gas..." And before we go any further, Amanda, "Axel" is a man's name or a figure skating move (named after a man whose name was Axel). The word you spelled wrong all eight times you used it should be "axle." 'Nuff said? 'Nuff said. Carter goes on at length about CV joints, providing such wondrous information as "When they aren't in decent condition, they can terrorize your driving experience. This is because the new design has given the front axels [sic] an even bigger part in the drive train then they had before."

We find it particularly amusing that Amanda doesn't seem to know that she has a front-wheel drive car, which is why she has CV joints. Why anyone would take maintenance suggestions from someone so obviously out of her league is puzzling, but Carter has no problem informing us that

"...to avoid excessive wear and tear, you should have your CV boot changed and your axel [sic] greased every 30,000 miles. The axels [sic] themselves should be replaced every 100,000 miles."

Wow: someone who actually believed a mechanic's scare tactic! No, Amanda, that's not true. Yes, the CV joint boots should be regularly inspected, and some say the grease should be replaced at 50K-mile intervals, but NO ONE will tell you the axel... errr, axle should be replaced every 100K miles -- not unless he or she wants to make some cash off you!

Carter then proceeds to provide some troubleshooting suggestions that are, gasp, actually fairly accurate; though her failure to understand what a CV joint does renders most of the advice questionable. We did find her assertion that (a) bad CV joint(s) would make "You loose a lot of mpg's" a grammatical classic... Most of her "troubleshooting advice" is pretty worthless in reality, since how does one know that "Your brakes wear down really quickly" or that your vehicle has "Slightly increased engine temperature" from everyday driving? No, Amanda just found lists of symptoms and effects of CV joint failure and conflates them.

Frankly, we don't think you'd be wise to take automotive maintenance from someone who can't tell the difference between a CV joint and an "axel" and clearly doesn't know what a CV joint does. Maybe you should find a reputable mechanic (one who doesn't upsell you on maintenance you don't need). We're going to just give Amanda her Dumbass of the Day award and leave it at that. We sure as hell hope this crappy hub didn't make her enough cash to pay for the repairs...

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