Mr Gadget I did my buddies the other day and everything worked out as you described thanks again, I did go out and buy the snap-on ball joint set-up and it also works far better than the ones you rent at checker, he also had the 1 11/16 socket on the truck. And thanks Mike(sledge) for getting the torques

 

MR. GADGET-Thanks for great writeup. I had to replace front axle u-joints, read your information beforehand and felt very comfortable with it. It was nice to anticipate pitfalls before being "bit". Thanks again!!

 

very good info, STARTED tackling my ball joints yesterday. Not having any luck getting the unit bearing off!! After 3 hours it still has not budged. Have sprayed almost a whole can of PB blaster. Going to get back it soon as it warms up a little. Will give the method of using the steering to push it off a few more trys, if no luck guess I will break out the torch & porta-power, hoping not to mess the bearing up in the process!

 

Hey MR GADGET I think you left out the part where you spray down the rim cleaner and hit them with a brush while they are off to clean off all the rusty brake dust. LOL J/k nice write up

 

Thank Mr. Gadget great information here! Did one front axle U-joint today. 3 1/2 hours total... Not too bad for the first one!

 

Mr. Gadget
Thanks for the great write up, with your help i may try this myself, i printed this write up and inserted socket sizes and torque specs and tools needed.
hope i can do this- seems workable with a little patience and pb blaster!!

thanks for taking the time to write up the procedure for us

 

Yep it would have been nice to have the clean rims but it was all the time I had to do the job and take all the pictures.....

Maybe I should have cleaned that rim and not taken the pictures....

I'm real glad that people are getting something out of my post, I always find short cuts to doing stuff and really did not like what the dealer said that they just beat them off..and it costs what it costs...

I have had several dealers call and ask if they can print it out to send to all their other dealers to cut down on cost and damage when they take them off the old way. Talked to someone at Dodge that was going to do a TSB but he never did the TSB from what I can find.

 

Mr Gadget, Your the MAN, Thanks!

 

this write up helped a bunch as i put in a set of pro steer ball joints w/ my spyntec hub kit. thanks!

 

Have to post for easy access.

 

I may be wrong but when I think about the puller vs the slide hammer method. It seems that both methods you are applying force to the stud flange. As long as the nut is off, I don't see where one method would hurt the bearing assembly any more than the other. One is an impact blow while the other is a steady force, however they are both pulling on the stud flange? I am about to tackle replacing my front axle u-joints myself. I really appreciate this article. I was going to take it to the shop, however after reading this article I feel that this is within my ability.

This article seems directed towards replacing ball joints. Is there anything extra that I would have to do to replace the U-joints. I am guessing that once the bearing assembly is off, the 2 axle shafts will come out? Is that true. I intend on taking the axle and u-joint assembly to a local shop to have them press the old joints out and the new joints in. Am I missing anything?

 

sounds right. when i did this to mine i also upgraded from the unit bearings to the manual hubs and the axles just slide out. i think i had to pry on them slightly to get them to pop out of the spider gears but it went well.

 

Just an update. I did the ball joints on my 03 yesterday using this press. (I already owned it, so why not try?) It's not ideal, but it does work.

The biggest problem you run into is that the ball joints aren't inline with one another, so you can't put the threaded rod of the press up through one of the ball joint holes. That makes some of the presses a little weird, you've got to get creative with the cups.

This creates issues with the bottom joint in particular. When pressing it out, I was able to get it started with the press, but after about 1/2", the cup bottoms out. No biggie, a couple of whacks with a brass drift and it was free.

Pressing the bottom joint back in, same problem... cup is too shallow. And because of the offset in the ball joints, you can't turn the press around the other way. So I took one of the open-ended cups, put a flat washer over it to add a little more height (the ball joint stud was sticking through the hole still), then a couple pieces of flat stock over the washer to make a press plate. Worked just fine.

So if you're resourceful and a little patient, you can make the $60 press work. That said, I'll probably buy the big press if I have to do it again. Figuring out how to make the HF press work probably added an hour on the first side (~4hrs). Second side only took about three hours.

 

Good to know. Thanks for posting that.

 

Great thread, I recently put a set of Dynatrac Pro-Steer Ball joints in. IT went just Mr. Gadget said it did but there was alot more swearing during my install. the Dyantrac's are more expensive but they're bulletproof.

Gadget, I'm gonna send you some wheel cleaner for the good post Brother. That brake dust is killer.