Upper passenger front ball joint went out. Making a racket under the truck and I can grab the wheel and jerk it back and forth without even lifting it off the ground. Clunk Clunk Clunk!

I've read the sticky up above about this....but given that my truck has been covered in salt for the last 10 winters and is pretty nasty under there....how much is this going to suck?

I'm not even concerned about grinding and or drilling out the rivets, but more so about the tapered fitting in the knuckle.

P.S. the driver side was replaced within the last few years. Apparently my brother (the mechanic who has done most of the work on it) tried grinding and drilling but had to turn to the torch to get the dang thing out.

Sigh.

 

I'm in New England so know about the salt part.

I did my uppers for the 2nd time last year. They were easy, about 20 minutes each. Of course they'd already been drilled from doing them the first time. A pickle fork made short work of getting them out of the knuckle.

It's the lowers I dread.

 

upper's are easy lowers are very hard if they have been drilled out already then it should be very easy. The main problem with upper's is ease of access meaning you are in the wheel well very constricted but the drilling out is not too bad.

 

This upper one has not been drilled out. So, i'll be doing that.


And yeah, the lowers scare the crap out of me.

 

With the top you can take your time this way pulling only the tire off.


Buy some grade 8 nuts and bolts that are the same size as the replacements are.


Pull one tire off drill a rivet out only 1 then insert a nut and bolt do the same till they are all finished so now you can either replace the ball joint or put the tire back on rest finish the other side or wait as long as you like.


Dont use the bolts in the kit till you actualy replace the ball joint.


I hope this makes seanse to you it allows you to take your time and space the job out.

 

All done.

It sucked but wasnt the worst repair I've ever done. Broke my picklefork and eventually had to apply heat but finally got the tapered fitting to pop. The ball joint was trashed, the boot was just full of rust dust.

Maybe 30-40 minutes of hammering, 10 min with an angle grinder, then 10 more minutes of hammering and it was off. Then I lost one of the damn nuts. It fell on a piece of cardboard I had covering the CV boot and I swear to god it never hit the ground after that. I searched for a solid 30 minutes and couldn't find it. It literally disappeared. I had a random washer style nut in my bits box that fit, so went with that. Torqued everything to spec and buttoned it up. Didnt test drive though. Greased the lowers.

Anyway. Done.

 

oh and I only smashed my thumb once with the hammer, so I'd call it a success.

 

Not sure why it failed, when I ripped the bushing off there appeared to be plenty of lubrication! (rolling my eyes)
163E3871-3A51-40B9-8296-B22323779C6C.jpg


10 minutes of grinding, 10 minutes of hammering the rivets
A81B1BE7-CAD0-4F7F-80C2-F6D671C16421.jpg


This thing was toast. All loose in the socket and rattling around
D7FB0D8D-FF4A-41F0-B5DC-92935205A3C4.jpg

All done. Pumped it full of grease, greased the lower, and called it a day. Note the mismatched nut because I lost one.
9DC0112B-5B30-4B87-91D6-7101BF7F3BFC_1.jpg

 

That's wild special red rust lubrication very expensive stuff

 

I am very glad I don't live up north with all that salt and rust..I knew an old timer mechanic back some years ago who was from Pennsylvania. He said up there you work with a wrench in one hand and a torch in the other.

Jimmy