I did my entire front end not too long ago and it handles so much tighter now! The worst part for me was changing the ******** bushings in the upper control arms that took me an entire day just for those 4 bushings since they were rusted in place, I had to use my press in reverse to pop them out for the install I pressed them in place by hand by making my own tool with some grade 8 bolts and washers, and some races I had laying around. I can not stress enough how this is the most painful thing when it comes to the front end rebuild. You can also buy the whole UCA assembly with ball joints pre-pressed for a little bit more, Although I hear the quality of the BJ can be questionable even by Moog or AC delco standards.
Next hardest thing was separating the ball joints please get a ball joint separator they are the best 20 dollars you will spend, and you will be glad you did, or you will end up making my worse mistake during this whole thing. I opted for the brute force attack and ended up deforming the tapped hole that holds the brake line bracket, to later snap the bolt when I forced it in. If you get one of this you will put it in place tighten it good and tap the knuckle then re-tighten the tool and tap the knuckle again til the ball joint pops out, I wasted almost a day trying with just tapping and a fork that I had that wouldn't fit properly, so please consider the BJ separator at harbor freight, it too fits a lot of other joints.
The next most challenging thing was removing the OE lower ball joint since those have 3 tabs that were pressed and you have to either chisel them and fold them over to make the ball joint fall through its bore or grind them off to make it drop. I again used the dumb Brute force attack, and lazily chiseled the tabs and used a 3 and 16-pound sledgehammer, Came out but it was loud and I was spent after. I would recommend the grinder since it will save a lot of time. The top ball joint is a joke and easy to get off with a press tool you can rent for 200 dollars.
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After that challenge the next hardest thing was the Pitman arm, Just get a pitman arm puller from Harbor freight, It will make it so much easier, I removed the nut using a adjustable wrench risking rounding the nut, but anything else would not fit, I used a long pipe to use as leverage as it was tight as hell. Then I can't recall the exact order but I think I used the puller to get it off after pulling it I think I had to undo the 3 steering box bolts in order to get it out. Before you get to this step I had separated the pitman arm ball joint. Installing it back is the reverse, pretty straightforward, Make sure you get the right 3 or 4 spline version whichever fits your vehicle.
Installing the ball joints back is easy, just make sure you align them inboard or as recommended depending on which brand you go with, But I would go with good quality Bj's to avoid touching this crap ever again, don't forget to use proper tightening specs or you might risk having a stud snap on you due to overtightening, or not properly tighten, I would for sure not skip the torque wrench for suspension related items.
sway bar bushings, Idler bracket, idler arms are the easiest of the bunch, along with the inner/outer tie rods, new camber caster kits are easy to do once everything is apart, just mark them relatively close to what the old ones were and torque to 140 unless you want random popping. That is about it really, You will end up undoing both cv axles so using a torque wrench should be easy. Thats about it really, any questions let us know
