Assuming that the noise you are hearing is steering stops, it's not a sign of damage to the truck. Take a look at the backside of the steering knuckle and you'll see the little metal studs on there that are used to limit the steering motion - those came from the factory with little hard plastic caps on them. Those caps get old and fall off, and the metal stud rubs on the metal stopper and makes that godawful-oh-my-god-my-truck-just-fell-apart sound. A little grease will shut them up temporarily, or you can sometimes find a fellow on EBay making aftermarket steering stop caps that are supposed to work pretty good. If you grease them up and the sound doesn't change then steering stops aren't your problem.