what to do?, upper b/j loose fit

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mopar56

mopar56

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I;m doing a disc brake conversion on my son's 74 Duster, I have the upper a arm's, spindle's, rotors, etc from the donor, I am replacing the upper a arm bushings, and upper and lower ball joint's in the new donor a arm's, one of the old upper b/j's was stubborn to get out and so upon re-installing the new b/j's one side threads is fine the other is a loose fit, any fix's?, thinking of maybe some tack welds at the top of the joint?, or I have heard the upper a arms on the existing drum set up, being as it is a 74 might be the same as the disc, so maybe I could use the original?, maybe there is an oversize b/j?,I was trying to have everything ready and bolted together for a quicker swap, thanks
 
Tack welds (three or four around the top of the joint) are the recommended fix.
 
Weld that baby in there! The arm is toast after this anyway so you will at least get one ball joint's life out of it before you replace it.
 
Same in my 64 Dart. The original factory ball joints weren't screwed into threads, but rather cut into virgin metal, thus they often take some metal out with them. The factory spec is something like 135 ft-lbf to install, which is OK the first time, but would probably chew up the UCA the 2nd time. One side wouldn't tighten in mine, so I removed the UCA, tack-welded it it in and re-painted. Actually, I was re-using the original ball joints (not worn) and had just removed them to purty up the UCA. The upper ball joints may last forever if you keep them lubed and replace the boots. I don't see the uppers carrying any significant force, they just help align the wheel.
 
I agree, you can make a few tack welds to keep the upper ball joint secure.

Also, your '74 Duster should have had large ball joint UCA's on it already, even if it had drums. So unless something was changed at some point, your original UCA should be fine too. Easy enough to test, if the new ball joint screws in you can use it.
 
thanks guys don't know if you seen my latest post or not but I cant remember if there is specific way to install the upper control arm bushings, not the off set ones, just regular but there is notch's on them, are they for alignment?, got them out, just need to press in now, thanks
 
Those "notches" dig in to the mount when you tighten the adjuster cams, and help keep the parts aligned for the long haul. Thats also why its important to not overly tighten them prior to having the alignment done and to only tighten them at ride height, so the bushings are not pre-stressed.
When you tack those BJs in try not to overheat them. Some have heat sensitive guts in them. And the pins in the cheap ones end up flopping around.
 
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