Dose anybody know of a good write up or can someone tell me how to replace my ball joints. I have found some good info on the idler arm bushing. I知 gona replace that while I知 at it. Any other recommendations on maintenance I should do while I知 in there are welcome.

 

what year and that stuff, did them in my 2gen truck was very stight foward, just looked it up in my chilton book

 

its very easy, i had never done one before I did mine last thursday. I did the lower ones, and all you have to do is disconnect the bottom of the shock, theres a bolt with a castle nut on the bottom of the balljoint, you will def. need a puller or a fork to disconnect the bj, drivers side took about 10 minutes of hittin, pass. side took about 10 seconds, then theres 4 bolts that come out of the bj, and i just got my friend to stand on the lower arm while i pulled the bj out. it wont take you long to figure it out, i did it with no previous experience or a manual to look at. HTH

 

Yeah, mine were petty straight forward too. I have torsion bars so i took all the spring load off the suspension first by jacking up the front end and removing the t-bar adjustment bolts. There were 4 bolts on top of the ball joints and the one castle nut below. Borrow a ball joint puller from your local auto parts store to make the hard part easyer. I think the new castle nut gets torqued to about 90 or 100 ft-lbs if I remember right. I installed ball joint spacers and replaced my control arm bushings and tie rods at the same time.

 

upgrade to uniballs and you'll never have to replace em

 

904wdPickup, I have a 92 4runner 3.0 4x4 add, may go to manual locking hubs, during all this, if i can talk my friend out of a set he has laying aroud

who makes a good kit to convert to uniball?

 

How did that go with the CA bushings? I'm in the same boat, BJ spacers waiting to go in but not enough $$$ to do all the stuff I want to while I've got it apart. Frankly the control arm bushings are the thing I'm worried about most though. I'm not a mechanic but it does look straight forward (until some complication comes up) Sorry for the threadjack.

 

It is best to use a 10-15 ton press for the control arm bushings. I made due with a huge vise and a 3 foot pipe on the handle for leverage plus a BFH to help out. Some people have been known to burn the old bushing out with a torch. The new bushings go in a lot easyer than the old ones come out. The control arms are kind of hard to get back on the truck my yourself, but a floor jack under them to help push them into place will help.

 

dose anybody like a particular brand ball joint; moog, acdelco, toyota? how about those uniball joints, can i get them to replace the ball joint or do i have to replace the whole control arm assembly?

 

I just put some moog ones in a couple months ago. They work fine. Keep an eye out on ebay, i got mine brand new for $25 for 2 upper ball joints where other places wanted $85+ per ball joint.

 

I went with Toyota OEM ball joints, they were $45.50 each from these guys :
http://www.toyota-parts.com/

 

I put moog in mine and they only lasted 3 months. They were shot. LOOSE. From offroading in the mud. I put the stock toyota ones back on. They are sealed and no dirt or watter can get in. You just can't beet the Toyota ball joints. (2nd Gen Toy)