Hi all,

 

this is a quick question to all those that have done this already and have experience of how they come out.

 

I am going to be getting a friend of mine to renew my front wishbones as I am not in a condition to do it myself at the moment. If we are changing BOTH the wishbone and ball joint at the same time, do they have to be separated at the three bolt join or can they be removed/refitted as one unit?.

 

I will be getting wheel alignment checked afterwards and getting new front tyres so want to set it up with a good start point to get to the alignment place.

 

Many thanks in advance,

 

Phil.

Hi Phil,

I fitted new wishbone assemblies recently, they came with new ball joints attached.

 

In answer to your question yes they can be fitted as one complete unit which is exactly what I did.

 

The only prob I had when taking the old ones out, was getting the balljoint taper to seperate from the hub. I ended up undoing the nut until enough thread was showing and cut through the visible thread (hacksaw), just under the balljoint nut, then used a hardened taper drift to separate the wishbone from the hub. Others use heat/hefty wack or both to break the taper its really what you feel happy doing.

 

Fitting the new ones wont be to difficult, I used a jack to press the balljoint taper in its seating when doing the nut up to stop it spinning. Bolts were torqued up with wheels on and suspension in normal road position. 

Thanks for that, just wanted to be sure as I thought it looked possible but sometimes these things can be deceptive. He will be doing it on a ramp, so we should be ok for access, and I have a couple of splitter tools he is borrowing for the day.

My old balljoints i cut off with a grinder in the same way as above.

 

Part from that bit its easy!, just remember to assemble your wishbones off the car (Obvious really)