2005 ball joint help needed

[subaruspy]

Hi, folks. My daughters clipped a curb last night and blew a ball joint. The stud is out of the knuckle, no problem. But we're having a hassle with the cup (pressed into the control arm). I have the c-clamp-type ball joint press on it, we've hit it with the penetrant and heat, but it's not budging. I'd be so much happier just doing this in the hydraulic press, but that means pulling the control arm (which I've never done on one of these cars), and I don't know how hard that typically is. And I'm compromised at the moment - I took a serious hit to the ribs last week and rolling around on the ground and doing this core-muscles thing is hella painful. So I could use some guidance. And what's with those fasteners on the bushing clamp? Normal nut on top, but it looks like some kind of odd-sized weirdo bolt on the bottom that they don't want you to put a tool on.

Beside just being able to press out the remains of the ball joint, pulling the arm would give us the option of replacing either the ball joint itself or getting an arm+ball for not too much more money.

Hope to hear from those who have done it, and thanks.

 

[RaggedGT]

I’m sure over the course of my wrench turning career I’ve done a few-but I couldn’t remember so I had to find a picture-and I can say unbolting the whole control arm would be cake,and I would recommend going that route if your ribs will allow it

 

[subaruspy]

Thanks for the reply. That'd be the theory, but... it's bolted in really miserably. The two vertical bolts on the bushing clamp (well, the outboard one, anyway) is in that evil height zone - too much bolt sticking through for a regular socket, not enough height available for a deep (and I just don't have the pull available to me at the moment for a flat wrench). And the steering gear has to be pulled off as well in order to get the horizontal bolt out. Very unpleasant overall. We're going to go back out and take another look tonight - daughter has suggested that maybe we're pushing the ball joint out the wrong way. Which is possible, but doesn't make much sense to me; the ball joint should be in compression, and having it pressed in from below suggests that it's kept seated by being in tension, which would be stunned, right?

 

[Red_LX]

So FWIW, I'm pretty sure the factory ball joints are spot welded into the lower arms. I tried a press like you did with no luck, and on closer inspection I don't think that is a press fit type ball joint that they use.

I just replaced my lower arms, it is doable but kind of a pain in the ass. The front bolt can come out if you can drop the tie rod enough to push it past the boot- that is what I did, I did not unbolt the rack. I bought some no name replacement arms from ebay and they did not have the studs on them for the rear heat shields around the bushing, so that is something to be aware of. I zip tied mine on and it works well enough.

At any rate if you have any physical limitations right now, this might be a difficult job to do. I had to really push down on the new arms to get them low enough to put the spindle back on.

 

[subaruspy]

We managed to get through it. PITA is right. No welds, but the ball joints are pressed in from below, which still strikes me as weird - turned over the tool, and out it popped. Pressing the new one in was a bit of a hassle, as it was hard to true up the press; I'd run into this years ago on my Grand Cherokee, where a parallel surface to clamp against was difficult/impossible to find on the upper part of the arm. Regardless, it's in, though I can see why people don't bother anymore and just replace the arm+joint. Pushing the arm down to get the post in wasn't too bad (thanks, codeine!) once we found the right steering angle to allow them to come together without more fight than necessary.