Wishbone Ball Joint

[Bowders1]

Can the lower arm wishbone ball joint be replaced without taking the drive shaft out. The nut looks quite close to the Drive shaft?

Mine need replacing as getting a slight knocking

rgds

Mark

[moley]

Not sure on the Octy, but most other cars I've worked on it's been possible. On some models I have unclipped the CV boot as it's been close to the nut & I didn't want to split it. Sometimes you have to buy the complete lower arm with the ball joint as thay are riveted on, but I think you can buy the ball joint with bolts for the Octy.

[mikey vrs]

yes you can remove it without disturbing the driveshaft nut(i did my front wheel bearings last week) as the nut gets close to the driveshaft you will have to press down on the wishbone to give you more space for the nut to fully undo off the ball joint.

[Bowders1]

Not sure on the Octy, but most other cars I've worked on it's been possible. On some models I have unclipped the CV boot as it's been close to the nut & I didn't want to split it. Sometimes you have to buy the complete lower arm with the ball joint as thay are riveted on, but I think you can buy the ball joint with bolts for the Octy.

Thanks.

I know you can replace just the Ball Joint as these are not riveted but held in by 3 bolts and I have removed wishbones leaving the ball joint connected to the hub asm in the past.

Just wanted to be sure before I attempt to replace in situ.

I Like you idea of unclipping the gaiter.

[Bowders1]

yes you can remove it without disturbing the driveshaft nut(i did my front wheel bearings last week) as the nut gets close to the driveshaft you will have to press down on the wishbone to give you more space for the nut to fully undo off the ball joint.

Thanks. The only other point is I know these ball joints have a allen slot in for an allen key to be inserted to stop it turning when tightening up or undoing the nut. Is there stil enough room to slot in an allen key???

[Bodge]

Can the lower arm wishbone ball joint be replaced without taking the drive shaft out. The nut looks quite close to the Drive shaft?

Mine need replacing as getting a slight knocking

rgds

Mark

Mate, did mine a couple of weeks back and I've been meaning to post up a thread with photos about it. I've got some free time tonight so I'll get on and post up!

But yeah you can replace them without touching anything else (I left the old wishbones alone and didn't touch the 3 bolts on the wishbone, as I replaced them too after removing the ball joints). I started by soaking the nuts with easing fluid and left them for a while. Then you can get an open ended spanner on the nut, and the nuts undo easily as they don't get torqued up massively. You then back off the nut until it comes into contact with the outer CV joint metal housing. Continue winding off the nut and it will push up against the CV joint, eventually popping the tapered balljoint shoulder out of the upright. That's all really easy and only takes minutes! Obviously when the nut reaches the top of the thread it tends to jam on all the rust, causing the ball joint to spin. Lots of easing fluid and some nifty work cleaning up the threads may reduce this problem, but I went about it in two ways:

- Got my dad the pull out really hard on the upright, essentially jamming the taper of the ball joint, while I got in there and managed to get the nut off. Worked for the passenger side only though!

- Second 'technique' was to tear off the rubber boot and retaining clip, then get some narrow jaw mole grips solidly onto the ball joint, holding it while removing the nut. This worked really well and only took minutes.

I was really impressed with how easy it was, and now I have nice new Skoda ball joints and wishbones! (I have car maintenance OCD).

HTH buddy

[Bowders1]

Mate, did mine a couple of weeks back and I've been meaning to post up a thread with photos about it. I've got some free time tonight so I'll get on and post up!

But yeah you can replace them without touching anything else (I left the old wishbones alone and didn't touch the 3 bolts on the wishbone, as I replaced them too after removing the ball joints). I started by soaking the nuts with easing fluid and left them for a while. Then you can get an open ended spanner on the nut, and the nuts undo easily as they don't get torqued up massively. You then back off the nut until it comes into contact with the outer CV joint metal housing. Continue winding off the nut and it will push up against the CV joint, eventually popping the tapered balljoint shoulder out of the upright. That's all really easy and only takes minutes! Obviously when the nut reaches the top of the thread it tends to jam on all the rust, causing the ball joint to spin. Lots of easing fluid and some nifty work cleaning up the threads may reduce this problem, but I went about it in two ways:

- Got my dad the pull out really hard on the upright, essentially jamming the taper of the ball joint, while I got in there and managed to get the nut off. Worked for the passenger side only though!

- Second 'technique' was to tear off the rubber boot and retaining clip, then get some narrow jaw mole grips solidly onto the ball joint, holding it while removing the nut. This worked really well and only took minutes.

I was really impressed with how easy it was, and now I have nice new Skoda ball joints and wishbones! (I have car maintenance OCD).

HTH buddy

Go on post them, post them . I am doing it tomorrow mate.

I now tend to take pics on most of the jobs i do and uploading them on here.

The Ball joints are the only part of the front end i have not touched yet.

Cheers

Mark.

[Bowders1]

Well did one side tonight. A bugger to do because it was in so tight. I used lots of easing fluid going back a forth with the nut. It came undone but no way was the tapper to be released tightening against the CV joint and I was worried I would damage the joint, so got out the ball joint spliter tool (a fork like item) and eventually after lots more easing fluid and force using a large hammer it came loose. Just the other side to do now. Tackle that in the morning.

[martziniuk]

Nice one, I've used an angle grinder on others cars in the past to get the nut off. Then they just seem to pop off.

[James19181]

Sorry to dig this up, but I'm doing this at the moment. I have removed the old balljoint, but now trying to figure out how to stop the spindle spinnin kn the new one to do it up. Did others just butcher an allen key to make it fit??

[kentphil1]

Place a jack under the joint to push the taper of the joint into the hub, that should normally do it

[James19181]

Cheers, managed to do it but didnt try that. In the end I found an old 5mm allen key so just chopped the short end down until I could get get it in

[dave190]

Can always disc cut the top of the ball joint taper bolt off.

I found putting the new ball joint in you have to get that Allen key in so just popped the hub nut and pull the hub out to get at it easy

[eka567k]

Having the spindle spinning problem atm with my mk1 vrs. Any pics of the allen key mod and where to shuv it?

[IulianE]

the best way to remove the ball joint is to undo the nut,run it back and fw few times and use alot of WD40 untill it will spin freely by hand.Undo it till stops in the CV joint.

Then hummer the spindle until the ball joint pops out,and undo the nut until gets out.

 

 

IF you won;t make the nut spin freely and will pop the ball joint out will be a nightmare to remove the nut,becuse will spin with the balljoit,and is very hard to grip it.

 

And the most important part: If you use aftermarket balljoint DONT'T use theyr nuts with the plastic insertion,they will undo very hard,very hard,une OE nuts,witout any plastic insetion,will be alot,I mean 100 times easyer to remove them next time.And btw OE nuts are more solid

 

Edited 12 April, 2015 by IulianE