Front Suspension Balljoint, Stuck Fast

Well I bought the special socket to fit the balljoint and a 3/4" Air Impact Wrench that goes to 425lbft and the balljoint just won't unscrew. I knocked the lip out that's supposed to stop it turning and even tried as much heat as I dare while still on the car. The socket teeth are just slowly eating their way round the balljoint flange. Does anyone have a good idea to try or do I just give up and do as I used to and strip the hub off for the local engineering workshop to remove it for me.

I had to take the hub off mine and put it in the vice. I think that even with an impact wrench there is to much 'give' in it while still on the car. It needs to be mounted solidly to get the necessary shock to loosen it.

Peter.N.

Yes, I think you're right Peter. I have had a good think though and have one last plan before going for the strip down option. I am going to get a ring spanner to fit the balljoint socket and cut off the other end so I can get it inside an akro prop tube. That will give me 6ft of leverage and to hold the hub still I will chain the caliper to the subframe.

Hi Assich.

I think I have to second Peter's advice. I've only had to do two and the first one taught me to bite the bullet at the outset and take the arm off to extract the joint. There is absolutely no substitute for having the arm securely held at an angle that lets you work at it safely while putting maximum grunt in ! Good luck with it.

Mike.

Hi Assich,

The only way I got my last one out was to grip the joint in the vice and turn the hub with a scaffolding pole. That was after I'd heated the whole joint with oxy-acetylene until it was glowing red hot. The threads are put i with loctite and the rust sees to the rest.

Heres a picture I took of the offending article when I got it out eventually.

cheers

noz

I got what's called a slogging spanner and with the 6' akro prop the balljoints unscrewed no problems. No heat required either. I took a few photos and will create a self help post of how to easily take the balljoints off while still on the car.

Wow! mine were pussy-cats to come off compared to those!

Must admit I decided not to loctite the new ones in.

Just looked at your photos Noz,...... had it been used down a salt mine?

Peter.N.

I replaced the left balljoint on my car yesterday. Now of course I don't have the rust problems you guys have, but still it is a bugger of a job.

Getting the hub off was the well practiced routine. I had arranged to use a large vice at a friend's place up the road and it turns out he had also fashioned a removal tool from galvinised fencing pipe. It basically had four prongs and a 30mm bolt had been welded to the other end of the about 12cm long piece of pipe.

I clamped the hub in the vice and after drilling away the peenings, I attempted to loosed the old joint. I think I pulled a shoulder muscle while doing this.

I ultimately resorted to using my angle grinder and cutting into the lip of the joint mount and kept working around the lip. You have to be careful that you do not cut too far down and hit the cast steel of the hub itself. Just work away at the metal collar.

What this does is two things. It reduces the amount and therefore strength of the metal collar holding the joint into the hub and it generates a whack of heat into the joint and hub socket and loosens any rust or old locktite. After 10min or so of careful grinding I put the tool back on and minimal effort with a 30mm socket and bar and the joint came undone!

There was enough heat generated in the old joint that the grease etc around the ball started to ooze out around the ball.

I cleaned up the socket, applied some locktite to the new joint thread and screwed it in. I then tightened further using the tool and knocked the peening in. I returned home and had the car back on its wheels in about 90 minutes.

Mrs UFO drove the car to the shops this morning and reports all is fine. It will get a highway test later today.

I might even take a pic of the old joint to show how much I cut away.

And now there are some pics on my website

http://www.craigdeb.com/photos/thumbnails.php?album=25





This post has been edited by UFO on October 09, 2007 12:46 pm