How do you remove the ball joint on a 96 Toyota Camry LE?

Answer 1

1. jack the car up , put on safety stands, etc., Etc. 2. Unlock steering so you can manipulate the wheel hub / spindle assembly as needed. 3. Remove wheel. 4. On the bottom of the Spindle & attached to the lower control arm is the ball joint. 5. First remove the cotter pin from the castellated nut on ball joint. You may have to clean it to find it. ( would soak it good with some PB Blaster or other penetrating lubricant at this stage) 6. Loosen the Castellated nut. (You will not be able to get the nut completely off at this stage because it is blocked by the CV Joint) it should be a 17MM - you'll need good quality open end wrench to prevent rounding off the nut. (once the nut is loose, I would work it back and forth to get the penetrating oil into the threads so that it is easier to deal with) 7. On the bottom of the control arm are 2 nuts that need to be removed, and a third on the top of the control arm. (on some vehicles these may be Rivets which would need to be drilled or ground off) 8. Once you have the control arm disconnected from the ball joint you should be able to get the ball joint loose from the spindle. - You can use a ball joint fork, which goes between the top of the ball joint boot and the bottom of the spindle and is struck on the end with a hammer. OR - you can use a ball peen hammer to strike the side of the spindle where the ball joint bolt passes through the spindle. 9.The ball joint will drop. 10.Now remove the castellated nut. I find that a pair of needle nose vise grips are useful for holding the tapered shank of the ball joint bolt so that it doesn't turn while removing the nut. 11. Install the new Ball joint into the lower control arm first. HINT. A large pry bar inserted into one of the holes towards the rear of the lower control arm will allow you to push the lower control arm down far enough that you can manuever the spindle assembly into place over the ball joint bolt so that it pops into the hole more easily. The following statement was here before this edit, so heed it if you like, but an alignment is not necessary, due to the fact that the ball joint is not an adjustable front-end geometry point. All replacement ball joints should be made to the same specification. It can never hurt, but is not an absolute need.

*After replacing the ball joint you need to get a front end alignment because you have altered the suspension geometry with a new component.*