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I replaced my ball joints for the first time yesterday, and have a couple of questions.
The top of the strut anchor where the bolt secures the ball joint shaft was filled with a black tar-like substance. Is this something that has leaked out of the strut cartridge, or is it something that is deliberately applied as a safety precaution to prevent the nut from ever coming off? When I removed the nut, the ball joint shaft fell right out! (If the tar is deliberate, I guess having it there is well justified!)
The outer 2 control arm nuts were attached to a single plate which had 2 bolts pressed into it. The ball joint from Groton came with 3 replacement control arm mounting nut/bolt/washer sets - no plate with pressed bolts. Is this plate just intended as a convenience so you can torque the nuts without having to hold the top, or is it also a structural thing that strenthens the mount? Can the plate be reused with new nuts, or should it just be discarded and the new bolts be used?
The original strut anchor top nut has a flange that spreads onto the strut anchor. The replacement nut with the new ball joint was just a standard nut with the plastic material inside to help lock it. I didn't think this nut was wide enough to properly seat on the strut anchor, so I re-used the original flanged nut. If properly torqued, is this a safety concern, with no locking ring and no "tar" to keep it from loosening off?
Bentley's recommends using new bolts to attach the strut anchor to the strut tower. The new ball joint did not come with any, so I re-used the originals. Is this a problem?
This may be a bit hard to believe, but I'm thinking that the ball joint on the driver's side was original (from 1986)! I say this because I was getting significant horizontal movement when I jerked the wheel at 9 and 3 o'clock, it had the tar-like substance on the strut tower nut (is this a factory install trait?), and it had the plate with bolts for the control arm mount, which is what is shown in the Chilton diagram. The other side which I know has been replaced didn't have the tar or the bolt plate.
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