Advice on removing spindle off of ball joint

bonestock94 · Mar 7, 2010

Hey guys, I started my 5 lug swap on my 92 and taking off the spindles with hand tools has been kinda crappy. I've removed both the tie rod and balljoint castle nuts, and the two bolts holding the shock in. Now the only thing holding me up is the spindle won't separate from the lower ball joint on the a-arm. Any advice on how to do it? Thanks

mc0311grunt · Mar 7, 2010

the right way is with a tuning fork. You said you only have hand tools so I will give you advice on doing it with just those. One way is to hit the spindle on the side right by where the ball joint is. That should break it loose. If not put the castle nut on backwards(the castle part on first) until it is flush with the top of the threads of the ball joint. Hit it with your BFH(big f**king Hammer) a few times and it should come off

84Ttop · Mar 7, 2010

If you hit the base of the spindle , the part surrounding the ball joint with a hammer a few times, it should pop it right off, make sure you have the lower control arm supported so the spring doesnt' come out and kill you.

bonestock94 · Mar 7, 2010

Ok, thanks a lot guys. I'm about to get to it. I have the rental spring compressor I'll go ahead and secure it now so it doesn't pop out.

l1k2gadd · Mar 7, 2010

When I first encountered the same problem I looked at the design of the spindles. It looks like the spindles were engineered with that stopping point as a safety feature either to keep the front coil springs from coming out of the suspension in the event of a ball joint failure or to save lives of unsuspecting people (like me) working on their vehicles. I would have never expected what you talked about to happen to me either when I was working on the GT convertible.

I used the outside-of-spring compressors (a pair of them) to replace both of the ball joints on my daughter's 1989 GT convertible.

bonestock94 · Mar 8, 2010

Got everything apart yesterday, got the steeda x2 balljoints pressed in this morning. Now to put the 5 lug stuff on! Thanks again for everyone's help.

RsStanG1987 · Mar 8, 2010

Ive never used spring compressors on the fronts ever. They seem more unsafe than anything. If they slip off that will mess **** up. I always use the a-arm to compress them and then lower them slowly. Even with the a-arm full down most of the time you need to pry them out. Next time spend the 10 dollars on the correct tool IEickle fork, its worth it in the long run.

bonestock94 · Mar 8, 2010

Ugh, now I'm having a real hard time getting the springs back into the a-arms. I think I had the wrong spring compressors, the kind that come in a pair and hook onto the outside. I just swapped that for the tool that goes up through the middle of the spring. I'm out of sunlight, I'll give it a shot first thing tomorrow morning.

And RsStanG, I agree about using the compressor tool for removal. I tried it first on the drivers side and that stupid tool came off and almost nailed me. On the other side I just used a crowbar to pop out the spring and it seemed much safer.

HISSIN50 · Mar 8, 2010

A clamshell compressor is the most correct one.

RsStanG1987 · Mar 10, 2010

Dont use the one that goes through the a-arm it wont line up right. just pry it in.

bonestock94 · Mar 10, 2010

I'm having a hell of a ****ing time here, I'm not a particularly good mechanic here but c'mon. I'm about to try the ghetto chain method. Compress spring, wrap chain around coils and bolt tight, and remove compressor. Place in car, load A-arm, remove chain. I'm using grade 8 hardware and a chain rated for 1300 lbs so hopefully I'll be good.

91Stang2k · Mar 10, 2010

I had the same problem when I replaced the front control arm bushing on my 91 GT. What worked for me since I had the control arm already disconnecting was compressing the spring on the control arm and lifting the whole unit (control arm and spring) back into place and re-connecting the control arm 2 bolts back to the k-member only took about 5 minutes and saved alot of time trying to wrestling the spring back into place.

I rented a spring compressor from AutoZone if I remember correctly, the one the slides thru the botton of the control arm and used the air tools run the bolt down and compress the spring.

RsStanG1987 · Mar 10, 2010

You dont need to compress it. Drop the a-arm push down with your foot. Pry spring in until the back coil is over the lip.then raise. This job should be done already. Just make sure the spring is lined up right with the notch in the a-arm This job should take 30 mins a side tops.

bonestock94 · Mar 10, 2010

91Stang2k said:
I rented a spring compressor from AutoZone if I remember correctly, the one the slides thru the botton of the control arm and used the air tools run the bolt down and compress the spring.

Maybe I'll go check them out, I've tried two types from advance and neither work with this car.

RsStanG1987 said:
You dont need to compress it. Drop the a-arm push down with your foot. Pry spring in until the back coil is over the lip.then raise. This job should be done already. Just make sure the spring is lined up right with the notch in the a-arm This job should take 30 mins a side tops.

I agree. it shouldve been done yesterday morning. But I've tried every variation of compressing it with the a-arm. Hinged down all the way, the spring is just too long, the length does not allow you to catch the lip on the a-am and have it in at the top at the same time. Impossible. Tried it with the a-arm off the car as well using my jack, no good again.

RsStanG1987 · Mar 10, 2010

pry it to catch the lip it should slide right in. Take a picture of what your working with did the spring and isolator break off in the a-arm its pretty common.

84Ttop · Mar 10, 2010

I never do springs from the front (disconnecting ball joint) I always leave that connected and remove the 2 rear bolts in the control arm. Lower the control arm down on a jack and remove the spring. Getting it back in is just the same in reverse. It is a little tricky getting the bolts back in, but you get the hang of it after a few times.

MustangBill87 · Mar 10, 2010

I had the same problem kept the rubber covers that are on the last coil of the bottom of the spring and it was a major pain but I ended up using one of the sides from the outside style spring compressor and tightened it up(from the top of the spring) had to cut the bolt down about three inches so that it would not hit the upper spring cup.got them in cant see any other way of doing it because ther has to be a curve in the spring unless you take out the rubber gasket on the bottom of the spring it might be able to catch and go in but doing that can result in the spring making noise when the spring is moving around

bonestock94 · Mar 10, 2010

Phew, got it finally. One side is pretty much done. Here's what I had to do. Compress it with the rental compressor. Then I wrapped a chain around the coils (2nd coil and 2nd last coil). I bolted the chain together and undid the compressor. So at this point the spring is a bit compressed by the chain. That was just enough to be able to catch the lip on the a arm. I jacked up the a-arm until the spring was firmly in place and the chain had some slack. Unbolted the chain, put in my new sway bar end link, the 5 lug spindle, and installed the strut into the tower. Then I removed the jack.

I really didn't anticipate this to be the PITA in this project, but oh well, I guess that's how it goes. Hopefully nothing else will be quite as frustrating. Thanks for everyone's input.

And for those of you wondering how dangerous this is, it really didn't seem that way to me. Like I mentioned earlier, I used chain rated for 1300 lbs and grade 8 hardware. The whole thing was pretty drama free.

5.0W/5.0 · Mar 10, 2010

Am I going to have this problem tomorrow??

I found a full set up for the front on a 95 gt... All I need to get is the spindles, hub, rotors, calipers, soft lines......Thats all I need right? Will I have the same problem he is having when I remove all the stuff?

RsStanG1987 · Mar 11, 2010

5.0W/5.0 said:
Am I going to have this problem tomorrow??

I found a full set up for the front on a 95 gt... All I need to get is the spindles, hub, rotors, calipers, soft lines......Thats all I need right? Will I have the same problem he is having when I remove all the stuff?

Id pass on the soft lines and order the braided stainless conversion ones from 5.0 resto. If you use the stock lines from the 95 you will need an adapter to make it work on the foxbody. You will also need 94+ ball joints or run a spacer on your stock ones. And yes you will probabbly have the same problem unless you lower your car.

Advice on removing spindle off of ball joint

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