4 replies to this topic

[Bagman]

I've never done chassis or engine work on autos, so I've been trying to learn a lot lately. Anyways, after helping a friend of mine work on his suspension recently, I decided to work on all of the suspension on my Monaco. So, I've run into some questions that I didn't get solved today and thought I'd mention them here.

I'm trying to get the knuckle separated from the lower ball joint and I can't find an angle at which I can hammer in my pickle fork that doesn't hit either the steering attachment or the back of the knuckle itself (preventing the fork from going in far enough). It looks like I'll have to take the rotor off in order to access the nuts to that remove the steering attachment from the knuckle (thereby leaving only the steering attachment stuck to the lower ball joint). It seems like there should be an easier way. Also, I tried the method of making a custom tool using a bolt and big socket, isn't working on the bottom.

Second issue, I can't seem to get the upper ball joint off. It looks like I need a special square 2 1/8" socket that nobody seems to carry. I tried using a massive pipe wrench but its the upper control arm doesn't leave the clearance I need for a proper grip. Any ideas on where to get this tool other than browsing google? The lower balljoint looks like the press-in kind and I suspect the rental press at O'Reilly's will work.

I was planning on cleaning up all the parts and painting them with a black rust-preventative. Any thoughts on what to do to clean them up? Just dip them in some special stuff overnight or some kind of spray and wipe method?

Also, I have all the books and such, so no need to post pictures or anything.

Thanks,
-Ryan

[Bagman]

Update:

Took the rotor off and that made getting the knuckle off easy.

Still need to figure out that upper ball joint socket thing.

If anyone does suspension work, here's a good set of captioned pictures where a magazine did a 1970 C body
1970 Chrysler 300 Hurst Edition Loosening Front Suspension Photo

[Beefmalone]

yeah i was gonna say that taking the rotor off is almost a requirement. Usually the stocker is a press-in and the replacement is a bolt-in, but i've never done this on a mopar...just GMs.

[Ghostbluesman]

Bag,
Looks like you need a tool No. C-3564-A...whatever the hell that is!



Rob

[Bagman]

Nah, that's the tool to remove the knuckle from the balljoint. I just used a pickle fork to do that since I was going to replace the joints anyway.

I found the socket on ebay that removes the ball joint from the upper control arm, so it should be here this week. I took the upper control arm out of the car and put it on my vise and use the giant pipe wrench. I ended up ripping the vise out of the workbench...oops