Harbor Freight ball joint press.

[Chris142]

My jeep needed new ball joints. The shops in town that do that kind of work wanted $800+ to replace them. No way was I going to pay that. I picked up the HF ball joint press for about $70.

Thing worked great! My minor complaints are that the "C" could be a little bigger. 1/2 inch would be fine. Fumbling with the adapters can be a little aggravating,a 2nd set of hands would help a lot. A finer thread on the screw would make it easier to screw and push the joints in and out.

But for $70 its a great tool regardless. Took me 1 hr40 minutes start to finish to do all 4 ball joints.

Ya thats my caliper hanging from the hose. It fell from its resting spot 2 seconds before I took the pic.

 

[14Accent]

Harbor freight can be a mechanic's delight. I just warrantied a 1/2 inch breaker bar that I've had since college, they gave me a new one no questions asked, The salesman actually commented on my bar: "The one with 3 lines on the handle got recalled years ago... how long have you had this?". I walked out 5 minutes later with a brand new one. I love avoiding making the Snap-On rep's next truck payment.

 

[RAR]

I have that ball joint press.. Maddox is the brand. I've used it to do ball joints on a 99 Ford Crown Vic, my 2008 Dodge Ram 1500, and my brother's 2009 Dodge Charger. The last one was a major pain to do but it worked putting them in.. I had to use my Snap-On 20 ton press to get the old ones out though... that 20 ton press was the best $80 I spent at a yard sale.

 

[Kruse]

I've got the 'Merican-made version of this. But I still had to take some black pipe and make some of the adapters.

 

[Red91]

That's a great price for a ball joint press. It's already paid for itself.

 

[Chris142]

Originally Posted by Red91
That's a great price for a ball joint press. It's already paid for itself.

Yep. And unlike sone cheap tools its still usable.

 

[The_Jeff]

They need the thicker coarser thread to not strip out. Some anti-sieze or moly grease on the threads helps too. I torque the tool down nice and tight then whale on the knuckle with my hammer so the vibrations can loosen things. Can then get a little more torque on the tool-- repeat until loose.

New parts go in the freezer to help them slide in.

 

[TheLawnRanger]

I thought about using this to change u joints. Then I considered borrowing one from AZ. I finally went with the 2.5 lb hammer instead. This would be handy to have around.

 

[Chris142]

Originally Posted by TheLawnRanger
I thought about using this to change u joints. Then I considered borrowing one from AZ. I finally went with the 2.5 lb hammer instead. This would be handy to have around.

It has instructions on how to use it to do ujoints. I just use a socket and hammer myself.

 

[Red91]

We have a small c clamp press at the shop that works really well for u joints. It may actually be a u joint press. All I know is it works for that job. My dad does them with the hammer and socket method. I personally prefer the press.

 

[Trav]

Originally Posted by TheLawnRanger
I thought about using this to change u joints. Then I considered borrowing one from AZ. I finally went with the 2.5 lb hammer instead. This would be handy to have around.


I use a horizontal press aka a bench vise mostly for doing U joints, some elcheapo sockets makes it a quick and easy job.
+1 on using high moly grease on the threads of threaded compression tools, Klann specifies its use before every use.