Upper control arm removal.

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Clelan

Clelan

Inferno Red Duster
FABO Gold Member
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I went to replace the upper control arm bushings in my 74 Duster and I am having a hell of a time removing the bolts. They broke off at the nut side. Any hints or tricks would be appreciated.

Cley
 
You're going to need some heat or chemicals or a combination of the two. I've never had that problem with any of the cars that I have done, but I have heard about it.
 
I used an air chisel with a hammer type bit on it and lots of PB Blaster!!! Back and forth a couple of times and out they came. I worked on one bolt for HOURS with a hammer and a punch. Stubborn little buggers. Good luck!
 
If you managed to break those bolts you are a lot stronger than I am. LOL
I have had to burn them out with a torch and use a crow bar to force the arm out of the clips.
 
Sounds like they,ve been hit with salty Canadian winters(rot)to beable to break one.Just sayin..
 
I feel your pain. Junked out a 74, finally torched out parts of the car (it was a ruster)

Recently junked out another, gentle tap and they fell right out, go figure.
 
I've had a 68 mercury cougar, when i stripped it down a lot of the larger bolts just SHEARED under light torque; freakin rust man... its evil, atop that i think the bolts were cheap and the metal just degraded over time to the point you could shear them in half with a 5 buck socket wrench.
 
...we finally cut the ones off a doner car...we were stealing ourselves four the removal of our but PB the night before and a long bar on the socket..

I have a couple of nut splitters.....do you access to one of those ?

Ian.
 
I just can't seem to get in there to cut them without wrecking the mounts. I never thought about an air hammer. Maybe I'll try that. I know a sawzall won't touch them. It just wrecked the best blades i could buy almost instantly.

I may have to wreck the control arms, because I have 2 parts cars. Maybe I'll chew the damn things off.

Cley
 
Get a long wrench add another to the end for prying,tighten it up til it snaps.It,ll break,then replace with new.
 
Problem with that is, if the head breaks off but the bolt is still seized inside the bushing you are really screwed!! At least that was the problem I had. The bolt would spin freely, but it was seized inside the upper control arm bushing causing the bushing to spin also. I hit the end of the bolt a few times with an air hammer and it broke free from the bushing's inner sleeve.
 
89on35s said:
I just can't seem to get in there to cut them without wrecking the mounts. I never thought about an air hammer. Maybe I'll try that. I know a sawzall won't touch them. It just wrecked the best blades i could buy almost instantly.

I may have to wreck the control arms, because I have 2 parts cars. Maybe I'll chew the damn things off.

Cley
Click to expand...

Yep, I can't imagine using a sawzall or even a die grinder there.
When I cut the ends off the bolts with a torch I also had to under cut the bolt since it was still caught in a good 1/8 inch of steel clip. The smoke and smell from the rubber bushing burning was rough too.
 
My preference for rust busting is KROIL. Soak for a hour has done the trick 90% of the time.

If that fails I use a Dremel tool with a cut off wheel. (Recommend use of eye protection and a mask unless you like dirt in your eyes and sucking it down when you breathe.) If I do a decent job of cutting a side off the nut, a socket wrench will break it loose. If not, I pull out my BFH and a cold chisel. Never failed to get the nut to rotate.
 
Agree with above.. I sprayed Kroil on some rusted stubborn front end parts including upper control arm bolts, and it was like... magic

Grant
 
Well, I got hacked apart and now I'm in the process of putting it back together. I got new upper control arm bushings from Napa.

It kinda appears like there were washers of some sort on either side of the original bushings, but my new bushings never came with any. I sorta screwed things up a bit cutting things apart, and I never looked close before i got to hacking.

Question is, do i need washers here? If anybody has an exploded view of this, that would really help.

Thanks
Cley
 
There are some ferrell type washers included with my Moog offset upper arm bushings. I think they are meant to accomodate 2 different bolt diameters. If your new bolt fits snug to the sleeve inside the new bushing you couldn't use the washers since they have a neck that goes inside the bushing. Hope that makes sense.
By the way, the offset upper arm bushings can improve alignment specs desired with radial tires.
 
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