upper ball joint replacement

[lumpy]

I need to replace the upper ball joints.
Can anyone give instructions? Any special tools?

Thanks

[dmwhiteoak]

I used a pickle fork on mine a couple of weeks ago , The uppers are the easy ones. Are you pulling the control arms off or changing ball joints in place?

[124JOE]

i rented a inner spring compersser from autozone
a BFH and a pickle fork,jack and stands
plilers and sockets

if you balljoint is riveted in
you'll need a grinder

[lumpy]

When shaking the wheel, the only play I observed was comming from the upper ball joint. Everything else
seemed tight so I am thinking about leaving the control arm on and just trying to extract the ball joint. The ball
joint has 3 nuts on top and one big one on the bottom. I'm wondering do I need a spring compressor or something to remove tension? And...after I remove the bolts can I pry or beat the ball joint loose?

Thanks...

[dmwhiteoak]

Its alot easier for me to do it than explain how but I will try. If I were going to change the joint in place the first thing to do would be remove the shock. Remove the wheel, place floor jack under lower arm and lift tension off the spring and get the shock out of the way. Insert a internal spring compressor through the spring and compress it . There is alot of force in that spring so make it safe. When you get some tension on the spring lower the jack enough to get some room for the spring to move around freely. I can't stress the importance of safety enough so please be carefull and take your time. Remove the large nut on the ball and the three on top of the ball joint and put about a 1/8 " gap between the floorjack and the lower control arm. Take a pickle fork and place between the arm and the joint and give it a few whacks with a hammer and it should break loose. Replace it, raise the jack to tighten the joint, release the tension on the spring, remove the spring compressor after all bolts are tight. Replace the shock and you should be good to go. That is how I would do it. I'm thinking its about 65lbs that the big nut is torqued to but I could be wrong. Good luck and maybe someone else will chime in with a better way to do it.

[124JOE]

all of the spring load is on the bottom
after disconnecting the top ball
its only one big bolt and nut to remove it completly
then move it to a bench fo ball removal

i needed a lower arm
so i bought one $72.50
it comes with everything
no fuss,new and quick.

http://www.internationalautoparts.com

[psg]

Additional question. I bought the upper ball joints from IAP and they come with bolts. I noticed the bolts go through the ball assembly and the A arm and hit the Kingpin. I noticed the other side that I have not changed does the same. When the wheel and tire are on and sitting on the ground is the clearance regained?

[124JOE]

when doing upper ball joints the bolts go upwards with nuts on top
when doing lower ball joints the bolts go downward with nuts on the bottom

[psg]

Roger that. Simple problem., simple fix. I wonder how the PO owner ever drove this car. Tnx. Psg

[majicwrench]

Lumpy, you do not need to compress spring, you do not need to remove shock. Place jack under lower control arm and raise vehicle. You have jack stand right? Place them under frame somewhere. Remove wheel tire. The big nut comes loose, BUT do not remove it, leave it on a few threads.. Now the hard part, getting the the BJ stud loose. Let jack that is under control arm down. Now the spring is providing force trying to pop stud out of spindle. If you are good with a hammer and won't destroy everything hit the spindle where the stud goes thru. DO NOT HIT THE NUT OR STUD. If you have a pickle fork you can use that tween the spindle and upper BJ. Once broke loose, jack up lower control arm again, and now remove the three little bolts/nuts and BJ comes out.
Keith

[lumpy]

Thanks to everyone for all the great advice.
I pretty much followed the suggestion from Mr. majicwrench. The key is to substantially loosen the bottom BJ nut but NOT remove it. Then place the jack anywhere so it is not supporting the suspension to get a little help from the spring. I tried to hit the spindle where the stud goes through but came up empty. Next step was to use a pickle fork with a BFH. It took a couple of hits and then it popped out. Now all I had to do was reposition the jack under the shock and jack it up. That took the tension off the upper arm to complete the BJ removal.

Cheers!