The knuckle and freezer is at home. The vise is at where I work. I took the frozen ball joint from my home freezer and tried to push it in by hand (without a vise or hammering or any other mechanical method) into the knuckle because the guy said it should "literally slide in with finger pressure".

 

Thanks..., I'll keep you posted.

 

I waited over a week for the local Car Quest to obtain the loaner tool kit CARQUEST - Product Information:Alltrade Tools Llc - LOANER TOOLS 23 Pc Ball Joint / U-Joint Service Set - For press-in style Ball Joints - Kit 46, 1 kit, sold and they told me twice it was on it's way but it never showed up, apparently due to inventory problems. So I shelled out 40 bucks to have a shop press in the dang ball joints in for me.

 

Hey, $40 is practically for free, nowadays.

At least they're in there. Now you can assemble everything.

BTW, did you get a set of QuickStruts?

 

Yep Tony. Everything is finally assembled, as of a few minutes ago. Waiting on that ball joint press kit that never came just added to the delay. Yes, got a pair of QuickStruts, one already installed, the other is next (when the rain subsides a little, after a while). Then, time for a little test drive. Oh, I should mention too I have appt for front end alignment Tuesday morn.
EDIT: Great to have those new strut assemblies. The coil springs were both broken on the old ones.

 

Did you make absolutely sure you got the upper control arms on the correct sides of the vehicle? If not, you are about to experience a very interesting test drive.

 

Yes. The one marked for the left installed on the left, and the one marked for the right installed on the right.

 

Wow, that thing is going to feel like a new car

 

Ok took it out for a drive today. Seems better I'd say. Yeah here's a picture of some of the old parts including the struts. One of them is broken on one of the coils on the end of the spring, and the other has two broken spots on each of the coil ends of the spring.



Also, just cruising driving down the straight road I noticed it doesn't veer or pull or drift off to any direction but remains going nice and straight when I let my hands of the wheel. Before I did this front end work it was fine too, even with the broken springs like that, so if the front end ever was much out of alignment it wasn't apparent to me, and if it is now since this latest work (which included new inner and outer tie rods both sides) it's still not apparent. I did count threads while removing/installing the new outers to help prevent it from getting all out of whack, so I guess that worked out. Nonetheless as I mentioned I have appt for front end alignment at a shop on Tuesday. It might be at least interesting to find out how much adjustment they might need to make.

 

Good for you, Steve. Job(s) well done. Now you get to enjoy the result.