Project SC300 Road Racer: Part 21 – Winter is Coming
Wobble attached to socket and ratchet with castle nuts and cotter pins in background
A wobble is immensely helpful in being able to remove all the castle nuts from the ball joints and tie rod ends.

OEs usually use castle nuts and cotter pins any time there is a press fit fastener (like a ball joint). Most cotter pins are wear items, although Toyota uses one that is basically spring fit.

 

OEM brand ball joint separator on tie rod head
Your local parts chain probably sells the OEM brand of tools, and they make a small ball joint separator.

Pickle forks are also commonly used for popping ball joints, but they have a tendency to mangle or destroy boots. If you want to save or reuse things, this screw-type separator can work a little better. It’s also pretty darned cheap. I’m assuming you don’t have several thousand bucks worth of Toyota specialty tools to do this the way the service manual says.

Note that OEM actually changed the design if these tools at some point. You can find some that have a ½” square hole in the top to accept a ratchet in addition to having the hex-shaped head. The hole / ratchet option can make life much easier as it can be a bit of a bear to get a wrench on the ball joint separator’s head.

WARNING: What you do not want to do is just hit the ball joint ends with a hammer. You run the risk of mangling the threads and then your control arm is garbage because you can’t replace just the ball joint. Get the right tool. This small separator is just small enough to work on the tie rod end.

 

Ball joint separator on lower ball joint
The separator is then used on both the lower and upper ball joints.

Doing the lower ball joint then results in the knuckle hanging from the upper control arm. If you did the upper ball joint first, the knuckle would want to flop around all over the lower ball joint. I think the lower first is easier. Your mileage may vary. I suppose you could tie something onto the knuckle to keep it in place, too.

The upper ball joint is a bit of a bear because the head of the separator is basically pressing against the cap on the back of the knuckle. If I had to do this again I might do it a different way.

 

Knuckle removed from car and laying studs-down on the ground
Finally, the first front knuckle was removed.

One down and one to go.

6 comments

    1. Metal fatigue, I’ve seen hubs and bearings both let go on track cars. It’s also usually very difficult to remove the stuck on inner race without damaging the hub. Even if you do a lot of the time the hub is scored and scratched in the process and you risk spinning the hub inside the race once it’s installed.

  1. Pff, I’ve been running good tight junkyard hubs on my road race Camaro for years. It’s about a grand to upgrade to to the Corvette SKF hubs with the adapters. You’ll know when they’re bad, and if they were good last time out no need to waste money. They’re not going to suddenly explode and send you into the wall down the back straight at Road America. As far as popping ball joints with a hammer, it also works very well to just bash on the knuckle itself while leaving the nut loosely on. I rarely use a separator anymore, so much faster and easier to give it a few whacks and the boots and everything are reusable too. You’re definitely spending more than I would, but it should turn out like a show piece in the end. You gonna go with sphericals in the control arms?

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