Pressing out lower control arm balljoint

I recently did the ball joints on my 2001 Tahoe. If you are removing OEM factory ball joints the uppers can be pressed out. The lowers are pressed in like a rivet. You will need to use a air hammer around the upper part of the ball joint to remove the mushroom part that is over the control arm. Using a press after that is useless and will probably bend as mine did. Just use a light weight sledge hammer and it will come out. Btw it comes out from the bottom.

OP, if you haven't done the ball joints I highly suggest just buying new arms. I pressed out my old ball joints only to find I still had a problem with my lower control arm bushings.

I managed to press out the old bushings using a ball joint press start the bushing out and a slide hammer to pull it the rest of the way. I rigged up a tool to press the new bushings in. It would have been a lot easier and less time consuming to just put new arms in. Here is my makeshift bushing install tool made out of a 5/8×10 " bolt and nut washers from Home Depot with a part from a ball joint kit. My time was worth more than what I saved lol..
The good is I now have all moog parts on the arms so it can be done.

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It's a PITA to change ball joints, new LCAs would be the quick and easy route.

As for the bushings, I've never seen the bushings in the LCAs go bad, even with high miles. The UCAs are a different story, they are usually shot before 100K miles. I've seen 200K mile LCAs though where the bushing looked new.

Wake said:

It's a PITA to change ball joints, new LCAs would be the quick and easy route.

As for the bushings, I've never seen the bushings in the LCAs go bad, even with high miles. The UCAs are a different story, they are usually shot before 100K miles. I've seen 200K mile LCAs though where the bushing looked new.

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My lca bushings had started to Crack on the edges. When pressing them out I grabbed the edges with some vise grips and big chunks broke off. There was obvious play in the center section of the bushing too where the bolt goes through. The exterior of the center section however looked new. I think the feeling of the tires not balancing is coming from this slop especially with bigger wheels and tires.

I know that weird wet noodle feel when backing up and the wheels feeling like it is about to fall off is gone as well as when I would uturn. It doesn't pop when I backup with the wheels at a sharp angle anymore either.

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Jeffro41 said:

I recently did the ball joints on my 2001 Tahoe. If you are removing OEM factory ball joints the uppers can be pressed out. The lowers are pressed in like a rivet. You will need to use a air hammer around the upper part of the ball joint to remove the mushroom part that is over the control arm. Using a press after that is useless and will probably bend as mine did. Just use a light weight sledge hammer and it will come out. Btw it comes out from the bottom.

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This is how mine was on my 04 as well. Air hammer for the lip, and then I was able to press mine out fairly easily after that. At first the press didnt want to do it, then i released it had slipped to the side and I was pressing on the arm and not the ball joint, as the surface is small and kind of slanted. Some patience and you will get it.

bottomline2000 said:

My lca bushings had started to Crack on the edges. When pressing them out I grabbed the edges with some vise grips and big chunks broke off. There was obvious play in the center section of the bushing too where the bolt goes through. The exterior of the center section however looked new. I think the feeling of the tires not balancing is coming from this slop especially with bigger wheels and tires.

I know that weird wet noodle feel when backing up and the wheels feeling like it is about to fall off is gone as well as when I would uturn. It doesn't pop when I backup with the wheels at a sharp angle anymore either.

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Interesting, Maybe I'll get around to pressing out the LCA bushings on the old set that came off my 05 to see how they look. So they were deteriorating from the inside and not visible from the outside. The UCAs showed very well how shot they were on two of my vehicles but no indications from the LCAs.

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