Front End Rebuild

[JayArr]

I had to change the engine and got carried away with the "might as wells" and tore the whole front end off but after examining what came off I'm sure glad I did. Almost all of the rubber bushings were on the way to failure having either cracked or separated. The upper ball joints were so loose they would rattle when shook and the lowers were'nt much better. I'll replace the tie rods as well, there is no play in them but they are pretty loose. I also decided to pull both drive shafts and replace all the u-joints as well as both seals on the transfer case. I replaced all the seals on the front diff and actuator before I bolted them back onto the engine. My hope is to have a tight front end with no leaks for at least five years.

Here's a pic of the parts laid out for re-assembly.

 

[Traz]

While youre messing with things I would swap in some new sway bar links as well. messing with my suspension a few months ago I added new ones and the ride was noticeably better (However I went with Mevotek and 6 months later I need to replace them already so be cautious)

Was it a bitch to get the lower control arms off? ive heard sometimes they can be a pain to remove

 

[JayArr]

Thanks Traz, I have replaced them, if you look closely at the lower control arms you can see them. Everything I've replaced was from Moog, all the bushings, the ball joints, the tie rods and the main driveshaft u-joints links all came from Moog and none of it was made in China. The u-joints for the front driveshaft were AC Delco. I'm done saving $5 buying the cheaper part only to have to replace it far too soon because it was a cheap piece of crap that didn't last.

The lower control arms came off easy enough with the impact.

 

[Traz]

My apologies, the picture wouldn't let me enlarge so I didn't notice them.
For a while there that's all I did was try to save. honestly ended up wasting even more money.

That's good to hear. I'm looking to completely rebuild my front suspension as well. the owner before me used cheap second hand parts and they all need to be replaced.

 

[JayArr]

I got this completed the other day by doing the front end alignment and it went really well. I had read a bunch of posts here and elsewhere that had complaints about the system of alignment by moving the bottom A arm around instead of the top one. It only took a couple of adjustments before I clicked on which movement adjusted cam and which adjusted camber and after that it was easy.

My procedure:

Put vehicle up on turn tables, I bought these years ago from Harbour Freight, they are big heavy things but they allow the wheels to be easily turned under full load. I've heard you can do the same thing with two 12x12 pieces of hardboard with grease in between but in all honesty these have been well worth the time and effort saved and I've only used them a half dozen times. I've measured the slight slope of the floor in my garage and built 12x12 wooden pads to go under the rear tires that level the vehicle.

I also own a pair of Fastrax alignment tools, They clamp onto the inside of the rim at the tire edge and have a level with markings to measure camber and caster and then there are arms that fold out to measure toe-in. You could get away with one of these but then you need to keep moving it from one tire to another and you introduce the possiblity of error if it's not clamped on the same as your last reading, also your toe-in would be hard to measure.

I climbed underneath and loosened all six of the bolts that hold the two LCAs, when they got loose enough they slide all the way to one end of adjustment due to the weight of the vehicle. I then climbed out and measured camber and caster on both wheels and wrote it down.

Next place a floor jack under the front cross member of the vehicle and jack it up, I don't believe there is any way to adjust the LCAs with weight on them, this is a 6000+ lb vehicle, Once the weight is off adjust the LCA. In general in/out will affect camber and a twisting from the front to back will adjust caster. When I say 'twisting' I refer to pushing/pulling the front of the LCA in or out more than the rear of the LCA. When you adjust this way the ball joint on the LCA moves either forward or backward with respect to the vehicle. Tighten the bolts 'snuggly' (with a regular ratchet is fine) so they won't move and then lower the vehicle and measure the caster and camber again.

Repeat until you get it right. Each time you want to make an adjustment you will need to raise the vehicle, loosen the bolts enough so that the LCA can move a little (but no so much that it slips out of position) after you move it snug the bolts back up and then lower it to measure what your new readings are. The adjustments were done by simply putting a large screwdriver up between the chassis and the casting of the LCA and nudgeing it a 1/4 inch one way or another. ( I read that there are special Moog eccentric adjustment tools but I think they would be a waste of $$.) You'll get the hang of it quickly. It helps to write it all down, if I nudged the front out 1/2" and the rear out 1/4" I would write that down and then when I took my new readings it was easy to see what the next adjustment should be.

Once you have the caster and camber adjusted you can measure and adjust the toe-in and adjust with the tie-rod end.

I had these LCAs complete off the car, I changed the bushings, tie-rods and the ball joint so I was starting from scratch. I still managed to get the front end aligned in about two hours start to finish.

The gear I had to buy to do this was an expensive hit to my wallet at the time but now that I've got it I couldn't be happier. All of our vehicles run straight down the road without pulling, our tires wear evenly and our steering wheels are centered. Prior to getting set up it would usually take at least two trips to the garage to get the alignment right and sometimes more. Between taking the car to the garage, having my wife follow me so I had a ride home and then picking it back up later in the day only to repeat the following Saturday because it wasn't right I figured an alignment cost us 4-5 hours each time. The $600 or so I spent on the tools to do it myself paid off after two or three of my own alignments.

JayArr