Joints that is...

I was pulling out of the shop yesterday after work and there was a loud pop from the front end. Sounded like a spring broke. Immediately the back end went pretty squirrelly and i almost lost it only doing about 10MPH on a left hand turn onto the main road. I drove another 1/8 mile to find a spot to turn around and the steering wheel was upside down and the steering was all over the place.

Got back to the shop and put it up on the rack and found this...

 

This was with the steering wheel perfectly straight.


I replaced the ball joints myself about a year ago.
So in short... Everyone should tack their *****. Joints that is.


But the good news is myself and the car are fine otherwise. Oh, I guess other motorists are ok too

It was just the excuse i needed to order T3 control arms and the new T3 strut bar.

 

I'm glad you posted this. Good thing you and everyone else are ok.

 

Looks like it also separated from the knuckle.

I did mine a few months ago with two tacks, and one side still fell out. It didn't separate from the knuckle so all I had to deal with was very unresponsive steering, still unsettling when it was going down the highway. The ball joint hole was deformed too much when pressing out the old one.

It went through several consecutive weekends at the track, but it popped out while cruising on a Friday night.

 

I got a new warrantied ball joint this morning and pressed it in. It Went in WAY too easily. Almost didn't need the ball joint press so I knew it wasnt right. After I tightened the two 17mm Shock tube bolts it popped out and collapsed while on the lift! It was that deformed. I said screw this Im driving this thing home so I dug out a junk Porsche Boxter wheel bearing race out of the "customer old parts" box and used it as a collar around the ball joint boot. The idea was to wedge it between the knuckle and the control arm sort of like a 1/2" thick washer to limit the control arms movement to make it nearly impossible for it to pop out. Nursed it home keeping below 45 MPH for 17 miles then ordered the T3 control arms with AE86 ball joints.

 

Factory arms are still available... Money well spent given this possibility.

 

Those T3 arms look pretty good, and despite their high cost are actually cheaper than I was guessing they would be. If I have ball joint problems in the future I will probably upgrade to those also.

 

This is why Racing Beat recommends buying factory Mazda lower control arms instead of ball retrofits which have to be pressed into place. I always just took their advice as the whole assembly is only marginally more expensive than just the ball joint retrofit.

Glad it happened at low speed and near the shop,

 

Same thing happened recently with mine. Installed new ball joints, one of them fell out on the first drive out. Back to the shop, Joe tack welded it in place and we're good to go again.

It means that some grinding is required to get it out again and I'll always have to tack them in, but honestly that's not a huge deal. Ball joints last ages.

 

I got the control arms in. Had to do some major tie rod adjustments as the alignment was hella off. I actually got it 99% aligned on the first try. Pulled just a hair to the left so i pulled back into the garage and turned the left tie rod out three turns. It pulled a slight bit to the right so i pulled back in the garage and turned the left tie rod one turn out. Went out on a test drive and to my surprise. .. perfect at home alignment on the third try.

Being that the T3 control arms offer built in track adjustment I added about 1/2" of track to each side which in effect lowered the camber several degrees. I then maxed out the positive adjustment on the camber plates and camber is set perfect as well now. I might look into 1/2" spacers for the rear to widen rear track as well.

The built in roll center lowering from the Corolla ball joints is noticeable too. The LCAs being three times thicker than stock makes the ride quality better.