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Upper Ball Joints

Vince

Member
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I recently noticed my upper ball joints have some slop to them. I can move the wheel back/forth when up in the air (grabbing hold of the top and bottom of the tire), and on driver's side I see slop in the upper ball joint plus upper wishbone grommets. Passenger side looks like all ball joint slop.

I plan to replace the upper ball joints this coming winter. Any issues with driving it like this? I'd say the worst side had about 1/4 inch of slop on the wheel when you move it back/forth from top to bottom.
 

TR3driver

Great Pumpkin - R.I.P
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I sure wouldn't drive it like that! That's a huge amount of play (should be none at all) and if those things break at speed, bad things will happen.

If you hustle, you can change them in an afternoon. No need to disassemble anything else, just undo the nut that holds them to the upper A-arm and fold the vertical link out so you can get to the nut that holds them to the vertical link.

With the upper ball joint out of the way, you can also undo the two nuts that hold the upper A-arms and replace the upper bushings.

BTW, it's a good idea to either put your car in your signature, or mention it every time. The details change from Triumph to Triumph, even sometimes between different years of the same model. And I usually don't even try to remember which car(s) each person has, since I'll get it wrong if I do. (Fortunately, I just read your post talking about a 61 TR3A, so I'm assuming that is what you are asking about here.)
 
D

DougF

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Make sure to use floor stands and support the spring pan with a jack.

Trust me, you don't want that ball joint to break at speed. The verticle link on my TR3 snapped on the interstate at 65 mph. Nineteen years later, I have vivid memories of the bridge abutment and oncoming traffic that almost made a great impact on my life.
 

tdskip

Yoda
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DougF said:
Make sure to use floor stands and support the spring pan with a jack.

+1. If you aren't familiar with the front suspension etc ask a lot of questions first since the spring has a lot of energy waiting to break you nose if you aren't careful.

This isn't a difficult job, and a new ball joints and bushings (I'd suggest you use poly bushings) will make a very nice difference in how the car drives.
 

TR3driver

Great Pumpkin - R.I.P
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On further consideration, I'll suggest that even if you take my advice above and slap some new upper ball joints in to drive this summer; you should probably still plan to disassemble completely over the winter. Wear in the lower joints is much less obvious because of the forces always on them, but if the ball joints are that badly worn, chances are that the rest of it is in pretty bad shape as well.

That means you will need to either make or buy the special spring compressor. Don't mess around trying to use one of the "general purpose" compressors, they don't work on the TR3 suspension. TRF or Moss will sell you a proper compressor (which practically eliminates any chance of injury from the spring flying loose) for around $50 or so (cheap insurance), or with just a bit of creativity you can make your own. Here's mine, made with 3/4" threaded rod & nuts from the hardware store, plus a bottom plate from an old VW bug generator pulley.

Springcompressor.jpg


And a shot of it in use:

DSCF0031crop.jpg


(Normally, the trunnion nut in the foreground would still be in place at this point; I had removed it to inspect.)
 

TR4nut

Yoda
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Based on the state of the upper ball joint I agree completely with Randall - its very likely that the lower section will need work too. But if you want to do something quickly I'm with Randall again - provided you still have shock absorbers in place, and the lower rebound buffers in place, you can replace the ball joint and upper inner bushings without much fuss - the spring shouldn't go anywhere and shouldn't need further support. I just replaced the rubber boots around my balljoints as they had broken - one had gone completely awol. Just 15 minutes work or so on each side and they are done.
 
OP
V

Vince

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Thanks for the feedback. I'll take a closer look and decide whether to do a quick upper ball joint repair now or wait and do it all later. I suspect the advice is good about doing the entire front end, the car appears to have about 62k miles on it and front suspension looks original. Is this the typical mileage you would get out of the front end?

Also, just to be clear, you can replace the upper ball joint and the upper bushings without removing the spring, correct?
 

TR3driver

Great Pumpkin - R.I.P
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Not normal, IMO, unless that is actually 162,000 miles or it was never serviced. That upper ball joint lasts practically forever for me.

Replacement rubber bushings didn't seem to last very long at all, though. I finally replaced mine with Nylatron, which seems to be lasting much better so far. I actually reused the Nylatron from the wrecked TR3A when I put the TR3 together.

The rubber seals suffer from the same fate, seem to fall apart within just a few years. I put all new seals on the TR3 in 2009, and some of them have literally fallen off already.

Yes, you can do the upper ball joint and upper inner bushings without disturbing the spring, shock absorber, bump stop, etc. As noted above, you may need to use a jack under the spring pan to get a bit more clearance around the nut that holds the ball joint to the A-arms but mine will usually come out without needing the jack. If you do jack the pan up, be sure to only lift it an inch or so; don't want to lift the car off the jack stands.
 

karls59tr

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What about the trunnions? Mightened there be issues with them if there is that much slop when grabbing the wheels at top and bottom and checking for movement?Anyone ever had a trunnion fail?
 

TR3driver

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karls59tr said:
What about the trunnions? Mightened there be issues with them if there is that much slop when grabbing the wheels at top and bottom and checking for movement?Anyone ever had a trunnion fail?

Certainly a possibility, which is why I suggested a full rebuild after driving season is over. But I've never had one break (in spite of using them in quite advanced states of wear), nor seen a broken one, so my feeling is that it's less of a concern here.
 
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Vince

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I decided to see if I could get one of the upper ball joints off this evening. I almost made it. I have the two halves of the upper arm removed and the nuts off of the ball joint, but I cannot get the ball joint out of the upper part of the vertical link. I tried hitting it with a sledge via a socket extension. I could remove the caliper and steering link and flop the vertical link out to get a lot more force on it. Looks like a tapered joint. Does it require this much force to get it out? Rest of the job went easy (once I removed about 1/4 inch of dirt off of everything).
 

TR3driver

Great Pumpkin - R.I.P
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Yup, tapered joint, hard to break. Some folks get them apart by simultaneously hitting the VL on both sides with two BFH, but I'm not that coordinated. Instead I use a tool like this:
TA-61900.jpg
 
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Vince

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I was able to get the upper ball joint out by removing the caliper and tie rod end, flopping the vertical link outward, and then hitting the ball joint soundly to release the tapered fitting. Since I've got one side apart and it went fairly well, I went ahead and ordered the two ball joints and 8 rubber bushings to finish the job. I'll dismantle the other side while waiting on the parts.
 
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Vince

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Got other side apart last night, and found something very interesting. The upper arm on the passenger side was bent, apparently from an accident. Result was the upper ball joint was probably about 1/2 inch too far forward, affecting castor. I have a friend who is sending me a good used set of arms (thanks, Pat!). It will be interesting to see how much difference this makes in the handling, I actually thought it handled OK before!
 

TR3driver

Great Pumpkin - R.I.P
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Vince said:
Result was the upper ball joint was probably about 1/2 inch too far forward, affecting castor.

Normally, that would be enough to cause fairly severe binding in the trunnion. Sounds like the vertical link may be bent as well, or the trunnion severely worn. At the least, I'd want to check how well things line up before reinstalling the ball joint. It may be best to leave the bent A-arm until you are ready to replace the other damaged parts.
 
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