2wd ball joints

[SteveMorrison]

My 05 2wd 3500 has 33 thousands of play on the left side lower ball joint. I tried to change it with a rented ball joint press. That dumb thing would not budge. Am I the dumb thing? Any tips on replacing the ball joint on a 2wd? And yes I did remove the snap ring on top first.

Thanks.

 

[RChriste]

I can't claim any first hand experience working on a 2wd 3500 but what I'll recommend are universal tips.



I assume that you are certain that your cups fit around the old joint and have plenty of depth to receive it without bottoming out the press? Also tension the forcing screw and then bang the hex head of the screw with a hammer, give it a couple of pretty sharp raps, you may need to do this a couple of times as the joint comes out and use at least a 24 oz hammer as a lighter hammer doesn't generate enough force in the room that you have to swing it. Some penetrating lube like Kroil helps too.



Two more things about your rented press, lube the screw with something that will not be readily displaced by the force you put on it and check to be sure that the press is truly square, not sprung. If the press is sprung and thus not pushing straight through the bore, you will never break that joint free.



If all this fails I have cut them out using an oxy acetylene torch using an asterisk pattern across the top of the joint and then bang them out with a good size hammer, I think my favorite is 32 ozs. Don't worry about cutting the knuckle or control arm if they are cast, not gonna happen. If pressed steel, you have to be more careful. Don't be alarmed by the resultant flames, but you may want some form of extinguishment available if they get out of hand.



Sometimes working on equipment is a lot like making sausage, if you know what I mean, the process isn't very appealing but the end result is desirable.

 

[SteveMorrison]

Thank you RChriste. I was afraid I was beating it to hard, but maybe I was not beating hard enough. I should rephrase that. Naw, lets hear the comments. I may have had a clearance issue come to think off it.

 

[p-Bar]

curious to know what you are replacing them with?

 

[RChriste]

I replaced mine with XRFs about 4k ago, can't comment on their durability yet but they have a million mile warranty and the price is right.

 

[SteveMorrison]

I am replacing the lower ball joints with Moog products.

 

[RChriste]

I was going to use Moogs myself, been a great name for many years, but then I read all the tales of woe on DTR and elsewhere and it scared me off. Just throwing that out there if you haven't read any similar reports, might be worthy of your consideration, but then again and in fairness, I often wonder what some guys do to their trucks to cause so many parts failuers?

 

[SteveMorrison]

2wd lower ball joints suck. Seven hours with a rented ball joint press that was slightly out of whack, and the tubes and caps did not fit. Either to big or to small and to short or to long. I was gluing cut-in-half washer together and stacking them to build a bridge in order to press the new ball joint in the last eighth of an inch. I am going to have a machinist make me some custom tubes and caps before I tackle the right side.

 

[RChriste]

Sorry to hear that Steve. I have read that some guys are using pipe fittings from Lowe's, Home Depot, etc... ... maybe you can find what you need there without having to engage a machinist? I have the Harbor Freight "Master" cup kit which has everything I needed.



One more thing, try to find a press that isn't sprung. You're wasting a ton of effort trying to push a balljoint with a press that is crosscutting the bore. I wouldn't be surprised to find that the press distorts even more under load. I had a HF press but it didn't make it through one balljoint on my 3500. I now have an OTC press, which does not distort as the HF press did, but still I ended up torching out my lowers. It was nice for pushing them back in though.

 

[RChriste]

Something else that may be useful Steve. I have a small engine, 3 stone cyclinder hone that I chuck up in a drill and clean the bores with. Stick it in the bore and move it in and out while rotating and it does a pretty good job of cleaning the bores and keeping them cylindrical. The stones have such a fine cut that you don't need to worry about removing too much material too quickly.

 

[rashwor]

I just had my front end redone with Upper and Lower Moog greasable ball joints. Done inner and outer tie rod ends too. $1300 out the door. 50% was parts and 50% was labor. I feel that the labor money was well spent. It can be a real pain to get that stuff apart short of a torch. I had just over 200k on the factory stuff and did not do the replacement a minute too soon!!! Drives like one of those new '11 $55k jobs now and it is paid for!!!Oo. Oo.