Bought all new front suspension today: upper and lower control arms, strut rod bushings, sway bar bushings, shocks, spring perch, spring isolator.
Visually the tie rods appear to be in good condition. I did not want to dive into steering yet, which is project for another day. Idler arm is part of steering?
Yes, idler arm supports the passenger side of the center link. Pitman arm connects the center link to the steering box on the driver's side.
Yea..and that bushing in thw center link can be a major pain in the rear to change..i had to pull the center link out of the car to press the new one in.....was alot tougher than i anticipated
Do i have to press the lower ball joints out or drill them. Im changing upper and lower, but the upper seem to be the more difficult
Its been a while but I believe upper and lower are both riveted. The lower arm is dirt cheap, I would even bother with trying to replace just the ball joint.
are you kidding me??!! damn! i just spent 2 hrs fiddling with my same spring compressor and used BOTH top and bottom hooks on the spring to get it out. i was really nervous about it breaking on me. then it slipped and popped apart at the last second. it looks like you rested the top hooks on TOP of the shock towers and just compressed it that way. is this correct? i thought about doing it that way but wasnt sure if it was safe. if this is the best way i could have saved tons of time and my nerves. then to get spring out i could have simply removed perch and unbolted the tension. well, at least i learned something. i still have my maverick to do and the other side of my sons tomorrow morning. this makes me feel much better.
I can't find a pic of the Maverick, but here is a pic on how I did it on my Falcon. Basically the same as a Maverick except you can't remove the shock tower support on a Falcon
In 45+ years of pulling these type frontends apart, I've never used anything but inside spring compressors... To replace the upper rubber spring pad the springs must be removed... Admittedly one like Jeff pictured would be nice, but now days the upper pads are probably going to require replacement... Pad is just visible at far left of spring... (pict was of steering sector, spring just happened to get into pict)..
