Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Arkansas
Posted: Thu Aug 14, 2008 2:20 pm
Yep. Last night, I pulled into a gas station, wtf? Creaking and groaning at every movement of the steering wheel. Twittering over little road irregularities. What would you do? Me too.
But pulling off the shock absorbers did not eradicate the noise.
So I did what you probably would have done next, I removed the stabilizer bar. I'm thinking, "I'll have this car stripped down like those Toyota Supras you see on the Cross Bronx Expressway, and it will STILL be making this noise." Without stabilizer bar bushings to squeak and twitter, I thought I might have some peace and quiet, but no. Even just sitting there and turning the steering wheel inflamed the creaky groany squeaky sound. Went under the car to reattach the stabilizer bar and pushed the car up with my knees while placing my ears near . . . the !*@#^%$#*!%^$#* ball joints.
I sat in the glow of cold flourescent lights at the Shell and just pondered. We all are putting in a lot of labor and a lot of love and a lot of cash into cars that are well-deserving, and we keep getting blindsided by Crap made by people who Don't Care save that your credit card runs properly.
Next morning (this morning, in fact) I went to NAPA and bought four 6 x 1 mm zerk fittings. I drove behind the the closed Cap'n John's Seafood Eatery and jacked up the front of the bus. Took off the right front wheel. Ye god's, does anybody maintain this thing??
Diamond tip punched the center of the ball joint caps:
Fired up the DeWalt drill with a tiny bit and drilled through just until I felt the bit "slip down" through the cap but before I started drilling the ball joint itself. Then I stepped up to 1/8 and 13/64 bits and tapped with a 6x1 mm tap:
But the tap bottoms out against the ball joint ball. So I have only 180* of half-hearted thread with which to start the fitting. After a painstaking decontamination stint with a magnet (thankfully the ball joint cap is steel so the magnet can pick up the shavings), I use a hammer on the new zerk fitting while turning my 7mm box wrench slowly and carefully to get one full rotation of fitting threads. Holds the grease OK as I pump maybe three or four shots of grease into the dry dry dry dry dry brand new ball joint. Here's the pretty new zerk fitting:
And here is the finished project, no more squeak, and I lost only a half day of travel:
Still pondering those who don't give a good goddamn about anything. How do you go to work as Mr./Mrs. Manufacturer and devote yourself to only making a lousy buck at any cost?
Colin
(called Walter at Bus-Boys for a rueful conversation about "GERMAN LEMFORDER BALL JOINTS! made in Brazil")
But pulling off the shock absorbers did not eradicate the noise.
So I did what you probably would have done next, I removed the stabilizer bar. I'm thinking, "I'll have this car stripped down like those Toyota Supras you see on the Cross Bronx Expressway, and it will STILL be making this noise." Without stabilizer bar bushings to squeak and twitter, I thought I might have some peace and quiet, but no. Even just sitting there and turning the steering wheel inflamed the creaky groany squeaky sound. Went under the car to reattach the stabilizer bar and pushed the car up with my knees while placing my ears near . . . the !*@#^%$#*!%^$#* ball joints.
I sat in the glow of cold flourescent lights at the Shell and just pondered. We all are putting in a lot of labor and a lot of love and a lot of cash into cars that are well-deserving, and we keep getting blindsided by Crap made by people who Don't Care save that your credit card runs properly.
Next morning (this morning, in fact) I went to NAPA and bought four 6 x 1 mm zerk fittings. I drove behind the the closed Cap'n John's Seafood Eatery and jacked up the front of the bus. Took off the right front wheel. Ye god's, does anybody maintain this thing??
Diamond tip punched the center of the ball joint caps:
Fired up the DeWalt drill with a tiny bit and drilled through just until I felt the bit "slip down" through the cap but before I started drilling the ball joint itself. Then I stepped up to 1/8 and 13/64 bits and tapped with a 6x1 mm tap:
But the tap bottoms out against the ball joint ball. So I have only 180* of half-hearted thread with which to start the fitting. After a painstaking decontamination stint with a magnet (thankfully the ball joint cap is steel so the magnet can pick up the shavings), I use a hammer on the new zerk fitting while turning my 7mm box wrench slowly and carefully to get one full rotation of fitting threads. Holds the grease OK as I pump maybe three or four shots of grease into the dry dry dry dry dry brand new ball joint. Here's the pretty new zerk fitting:
And here is the finished project, no more squeak, and I lost only a half day of travel:
Still pondering those who don't give a good goddamn about anything. How do you go to work as Mr./Mrs. Manufacturer and devote yourself to only making a lousy buck at any cost?
Colin
(called Walter at Bus-Boys for a rueful conversation about "GERMAN LEMFORDER BALL JOINTS! made in Brazil")