Ball joints? Are Festiva & Aspire the same?

[bobstad]

When work was done on my car a couple days ago; the shop told me that the car has a bad ball joint on one side. I've been noticing this quite awhile; something not quite tight enough in the steering, so a feeling of slight wobble or something a little loose, at speed on the freeway; for instance.

I've driven other cars or trucks far worse; though for the sake of the tires and as well, confident, enjoyable driving; I'd like to go through the whole front end, to get everything up to snuff.

I'm also doing the Aspire brake upgrade; so, a natural time to do anything associated with the front suspension. I think I recall reading that the Festiva and Aspire ball joints are the same; though forget for sure?

[jbibb1]

The ball joint is part of the lower control arm (LCA) and is not able to be changed without replacing the whole LCA. The Festy and Aspire LCA are not the same

[Team Lightning]

Aspire lower control arms are longer than the festiva ones. The stock festiva Cv axles won't stay in place if you use them on a festiva with aspire or festiva steering knuckles.

[walth]

If you have play in the steering, even slight, I'd recommend changing the innter tie rods. Ebay has a couple deals on inner and outer tie rods and LCA's included for 80 bucks or so. 1>> 190537394349 2>>270972526962 It's even better when FMS is selling their kit because it's everything plus the tie rack boots and maybe some other stuff too

But if you're inner tie rods (ITRE's) don't have play then I would just get festy LCA's because you need aspire OTRE's

If you install the aspire sway bar you'll tighten up that front end in a MAJOR way! I love the aspire sway bar.

anyways, good luck and follow the guys above as their 100% correct. As bebandit says, it'll literally pull the axle out of the trans at speed with use of the aspire LCA

[Bert]

As they've been saying in the aforementioned posts; get Festy lower control arms (LCAs) because you're going to retain them when Aspire or Rio fixins go on the front, including Aspire sway bar. I tried Aspire LCAs on my Festy/Aspire swap initially and not only was the wheel castor/camber (closeness to vertical) way off but one of the Festy driveaxles popped loose 30 feet down the road and peed away much of the transmission fluid. And as walth says start looking around for Aspire tie rods (OTRE outer tie rod end) for this undertaking as well. They appear to be identical to Festy but take my word for it they aren't. Haynes Manual devotes no time or pictures to inner tie rod ends but guaranteed the search feature here will show you what is involved in re-newing them.

[walth]

I watched Skeeter (Nate) do a inner TRE using a ratchet strap on the end of a wrench (possibly adjustable to make it pretty precise) and the strap wrapped around the sway bar so to keep consistent pressure on the wrench to have a free hand to wack the wrench with a hammer/mallet.

just another way of doing it. Never searched or done one.. but I know they are extremely extremely tight and for a good reason!!

[Christ]

To knock the OTR from the hub, just hit the hub at the OTR mount with a hammer from the rear toward the axle. One god smack will knock the taper loose.

Loosen the lock nut by turning the wheel opposite the side you want to change and ptting a wrench on the lock nut while its still installed in the hub. Chances are, you'll turn the inner tie rod, which puts the rear of the tire further out as the OTR gets pushed further out to the end of the threads.

[georgeb]

Spray the beejeezus out of the pivot bolt cage nut through the access hole in the frame rail with PB or WD a few days before you begin.

[Bert]

Wow! The casually-used abbreviations for ordinary car parts here would already intimidate a WalMart-wrench-wielding novice. Perhaps a humourous central dictionary on the site would be wise.
Took me awhile just to figure out what "BFH" was with regard to removal/assemble "striking force" a few years ago. Wonderfully apt term (once I figured it out) but perhaps not to be repeated in mixed company. My own 'expletive-deleted' descriptions of some things have been carefully watched on this site too, and one day I'll find out if GenevaDirt has a sense of humour (censorship-wise) or belongs to some far-out church of god, flic-a Chick food chain, or whether I have to start using abbreviations too.

[getnpsi]

Heh. Figuring out abbreviations without looking them up makes you feel like you've arrived, you earned that silly iq number they assigned you at age 8.

[Christ]

BFH? Bottom folded handkerchief?

[Aaronbrook37]

BFH? Bottom folded handkerchief?

Big *censored* hammer.

[Movin]

Quite the popular tool really!

[walth]

handkerchief, lol

just don't hit the thumb!!

[Movin]

Some how this usually stretches the limits of ones linguistic ability..
resulting in some profound descriptions that do no honor to ones
family, social preferences, siblings and perhaps animals..Understood
of course that none of the verbal references are true, it is strictly a
normal release that confirms ones presence in the universe and his
desire to stay put!