replacing lower ball joints

[adpsimpson]

Got this done - see post below

Trying to replace the lower ball joints, left and right. In true try-first-ask-later fashion, is there anything else I need to remove to allow them to come off, or will the wishbone simply drop down (on the shock absorber?) to allow space for it to come out?

[hiroler]

ive just done both mine at the weekend. the lower arm will not drop down you will need a long bar to lever it out. i used a ball joint splitter (tuning fork type. its also good idea to undo the ARB bracket to allow it to move down! it was a bit of a pain but got it done in the end!!

[adpsimpson]

Hey, got it done too. It's been described as a 15 minute job here - not strictly fair! Large levers have the potential to destroy things (including fingers and hands) pretty quickly, so I wasn't keen on that method. I ended up getting it all done without - hopefully it'll help others to have a rough procedure described here.

1. Put the front of the surf on axle stands
2. Remove front wheels
3. Remove 4 retaining bolts and the castle nut on each ball joint, and use a splitter to loosen each one (tuning fork or screw on one both work).
4. Remove large bolt (23mm) retaining bottom of shock absorber (l and r)
5. Remove 2 bolts from one of the 2 anti-roll bar brackets (one seemed to be enough, no need to remove both)
6. use carefully positioned bottle jack to lift the upper wishbone (one side at a time) - this should create enough space to remove the old joint and get the new one in.
7. Replace all removed nuts and bolts, wheels etc and tighten up
8. DOUBLE CHECK EVERYTHING you loosened, or better get someone else to - this is a critical steering component.

Step 6 could probably be avoided by wedging a block of wood between the suspension bottom stop and the upper wishbone (bottom of the back arm) before jacking up the vehicle, so that the upper wishbone is held up - the lower wishbone will then pull/fall free without needing to jack up the upper wishbone.

Quick note - if you don't know what you're doing, don't learn on steering components unless you can get someone who does to help you/double check your work.