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Thread: How To D3 lower front suspension arms

  1. #1
    Ean Austral Guest

    How To D3 lower front suspension arms

    Gday All,

    This is how I changed my lower arms , and after much reading etc, and a good chat to the head mechanic at TRS in Lonsdale SA, this is done by me, but really his way. For the week before I tried this I soaked all the bolts and joints with CRC daily as I didn’t want to battle seized bolts. Just so you know I have never done this before or any suspension type work before except change the odd shockie ,but found it not that hard

    You need the following tools,

    32mm socket and a big breaker bar / tension wrench, 24mmsocket and spanner( 15/16 does fit but I found I needed the space so used 24mm.13/16mm socket.hammers, big centre punch or brass drift and a paint pen.

    Uploaded with ImageShack.us
    Jack the car and support it how you see fit, but remember you will be working under it. Remove the front wheels. This is where you will need someone to help by holding their foot on the brake peddle whilst you use the 32mm socket and breaker bar to undo the hub nut. These are tight, so make sure you have eaten your spinach, my breaker bar/tension wrench is a 1’ drive but think a ¾ drive would work. Take the nut all the way off. This is where I marked the camber bolts with the paint pen.

    Uploaded with ImageShack.us
    Now its time to grab the centre punch or brass drift and free the half shaft. It will move back towards the diff about 1-2 “ and you should be able to move it in and out with your finger, and the thread should go back to the centre of the hub. Use plenty of CRC on the front and back if it doesn’t move after 5-6 whacks. Once this is free, next is the bottom ball joint, remove the nut, and I found several good whacks on the housing and a couple on the bottom broke the taper and the joint came free.

    Uploaded with ImageShack.us

    Next loosen and remove the bolts holding the shockie and the front and rear camber bolts. The rear camber bolt is the 1 that could cause trouble. These are tight, and they are a struggle as the nut end has a housing around it and the thread of the bolt sticks out along way so I never had a socket that I could use ( this is where the 24mm spanner worked better than the 15/16 here ). The arm will sit there on its own, so no need to worry about it falling. You will be very surprised how much movement is in the whole suspension by now.

    Now once they are all out, grab the brake calliper in 1 handand reach around behind the disc with the other and grab the half shaft with the other ( if you push the centre in and out you will see the shaft moving outof the wheel bearing housing ) Pull the calliper towards you, and the half shaft towards the diff and with a bit of wiggling the shaft will come out the back.Once you have done this, the whole arm can now be lifted up, letting the balljoint come out and the whole arm drops to the floor.

    Uploaded with ImageShack.us
    Now its really the reverse. Before starting get your new camber bolts and copy the paint marks from the old bolts ( remember which isfront and back )

    Put the ball joint into the housing , then pull the brake calliper towards you and feed the half shaft back into the wheel bearing housing. Once this is done you can the fit the bolts to the Shockie and front and rear camber bolts thru the bushes

    Uploaded with ImageShack.us

    Once you have feed the bolts thru put the washes back on and start to tighten them up, but keep the bolt head end still ( aligned with thepaint marks.) and tighten the nut end only (You will see that there is some groves on the arm, which the oval shaped washer sits between). Once they are semi tight, then check the paint marks are aligned still and tighten them up. Tighten up the lower ball joint nut then the main wheel nut.

    These need to be tight, but because I could only get a spanner onto the nut end, I couldn’t use a tension wrench, so just tightened them as much as I could. You will also need to get someone to hold the brake peddle when you tension up the main wheel nut as they are bloody tight. If you find the ball joint turns when you are tightening the nut, jack up the housing as close to the ball joint as possible and it should put some weight on the joint and the nut will tighten.

    The manual tells you to measure from the centre of the wheel nut to the bottom of the wheel arch, but I found this impossible as the suspension is hanging at full drop, so how do you achieve this im not sure. It also tells you to get a wheel alignment which is happening tomorrow..

    Took about 4 hrs all up to do, but could be done alot quicker with a hoist or decent jack stands etc. (2nd side took about 1 hour.)

    Hope this helps.

    Cheers Ean

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Dec 2009
    Location
    Ranelagh, Tasmania
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    Thanks Ean, this is my next project, luckily I have access to a hoist and air so it should be fairly easy.

    Did you use the D4 lower arms?
    I have been told it is easier to cut the camber bolts and replace them rather than try removing them from the arms but you just soaked them with CRC? Which do you think would be easier?
    Fuji white RRS L494 AB

  3. #3
    Ean Austral Guest
    Quote Originally Posted by Geedublya View Post
    Thanks Ean, this is my next project, luckily I have access to a hoist and air so it should be fairly easy.

    Did you use the D4 lower arms?
    I have been told it is easier to cut the camber bolts and replace them rather than try removing them from the arms but you just soaked them with CRC? Which do you think would be easier?
    Anything that involves a grinder and me is a recipe for trouble. I think if you have access to a hoist then could be ok, but still think its easier to undo the bolts. 1 was tight but a whack with the hammer and it freed up.
    It would be a hard job to cut them out laying on your back as I only had stands / jacks and blocks

    I did use new bolts and covered them in copper coat, and they should be alot easier if I ever do it again. I just ordered them from TRS so assume they are D3 arms with the newer type bushes.

    The manual tells you to pull the top arms off, but I never did that and found that way I did it was reasonably easy. The main thing is to get the half shaft moving so it comes free of the wheel bearing housing, if you dont you cant get the bottom ball joint out.

    Cheers Ean

    PS, think you would have a hard job cutting the camber bolts out, would say you would have to cut the arm near the bush, then you may be able to get into the bolt, as I think they rust inside the bush so you would have to cut both ends plus the bush. A job im glad I never had to attempt.

  4. #4
    Ean Austral Guest
    The bolts seem to be the most important part as it will play havoc with your wheel alignment so make sure you mark the new bolts as close to the old as possible.


    Uploaded with ImageShack.us

    and as I said remember or mark which is front and back.

    Something I did learn doing this job was how crap the landrover wheel brace and jack are. Bent the wheel brace taking the wheels off...

    Cheers Ean

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Oct 2012
    Location
    Perth
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    2,353
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    Gutsy move, thank you.

    What is the best deal / going rate for the new lower arms and is there any discount out there for AULRO members to buy direct?

  6. #6
    Ean Austral Guest
    Gday All,

    Well had the wheel alignment done, and looking at where my marks were they were very close.

    Now I never told the bride what I did to the car, and I drove it to the wheel aligner, and the got her to drive it home. The comment was "I cant beleive how much better the car drive's".

    Drove it myself last night and must say the difference is very noticable.

    So the $$ and the time doing the job was worth it.

    Cheers Ean

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Aug 2006
    Location
    Kingston, Tassie, OZ.
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    Good stuff Ean!!

    One thing I would suggest, and it is quite important, is that you don't fully tighten the camber bolts that go through the bushes until the vehicle is resting at ride height. Reason being that as the arm articulates back to normal position IE when vehicle is down resting on its wheels, the bush becomes loaded up and promotes early failure if fully nipped at full suspension droop. This isn't really a problem if a wheel alignment is being done ASAP as they will have to loosen them to adjust, but I would certainly try and avoid it where possible.

    JC
    The Isuzu 110. Solid and as dependable as a rock, coming soon with auto box😊
    The Range Rover L322 4.4.TTDV8 ....probably won't bother with the remap..😈

  8. #8
    Ean Austral Guest
    Quote Originally Posted by justinc View Post
    Good stuff Ean!!

    One thing I would suggest, and it is quite important, is that you don't fully tighten the camber bolts that go through the bushes until the vehicle is resting at ride height. Reason being that as the arm articulates back to normal position IE when vehicle is down resting on its wheels, the bush becomes loaded up and promotes early failure if fully nipped at full suspension droop. This isn't really a problem if a wheel alignment is being done ASAP as they will have to loosen them to adjust, but I would certainly try and avoid it where possible.

    JC
    Thanks Justin,

    I was told and also even the service manual says to get a wheel alignment done straight after replacing the arms.. which is what I did and would recommend.

    Cheers Ean

  9. #9
    Swarty Guest
    Quote Originally Posted by Ean Austral View Post
    Gday All,

    This is how I changed my lower arms , and after much reading etc, and a good chat to the head mechanic at TRS in Lonsdale SA, this is done by me, but really his way. For the week before I tried this I soaked all the bolts and joints with CRC daily as I didn’t want to battle seized bolts. Just so you know I have never done this before or any suspension type work before except change the odd shockie ,but found it not that hard

    You need the following tools,

    32mm socket and a big breaker bar / tension wrench, 24mmsocket and spanner( 15/16 does fit but I found I needed the space so used 24mm.13/16mm socket.hammers, big centre punch or brass drift and a paint pen.

    Uploaded with ImageShack.us
    Jack the car and support it how you see fit, but remember you will be working under it. Remove the front wheels. This is where you will need someone to help by holding their foot on the brake peddle whilst you use the 32mm socket and breaker bar to undo the hub nut. These are tight, so make sure you have eaten your spinach, my breaker bar/tension wrench is a 1’ drive but think a ¾ drive would work. Take the nut all the way off. This is where I marked the camber bolts with the paint pen.

    Uploaded with ImageShack.us
    Now its time to grab the centre punch or brass drift and free the half shaft. It will move back towards the diff about 1-2 “ and you should be able to move it in and out with your finger, and the thread should go back to the centre of the hub. Use plenty of CRC on the front and back if it doesn’t move after 5-6 whacks. Once this is free, next is the bottom ball joint, remove the nut, and I found several good whacks on the housing and a couple on the bottom broke the taper and the joint came free.

    Uploaded with ImageShack.us

    Next loosen and remove the bolts holding the shockie and the front and rear camber bolts. The rear camber bolt is the 1 that could cause trouble. These are tight, and they are a struggle as the nut end has a housing around it and the thread of the bolt sticks out along way so I never had a socket that I could use ( this is where the 24mm spanner worked better than the 15/16 here ). The arm will sit there on its own, so no need to worry about it falling. You will be very surprised how much movement is in the whole suspension by now.

    Now once they are all out, grab the brake calliper in 1 handand reach around behind the disc with the other and grab the half shaft with the other ( if you push the centre in and out you will see the shaft moving outof the wheel bearing housing ) Pull the calliper towards you, and the half shaft towards the diff and with a bit of wiggling the shaft will come out the back.Once you have done this, the whole arm can now be lifted up, letting the balljoint come out and the whole arm drops to the floor.

    Uploaded with ImageShack.us
    Now its really the reverse. Before starting get your new camber bolts and copy the paint marks from the old bolts ( remember which isfront and back )

    Put the ball joint into the housing , then pull the brake calliper towards you and feed the half shaft back into the wheel bearing housing. Once this is done you can the fit the bolts to the Shockie and front and rear camber bolts thru the bushes

    Uploaded with ImageShack.us

    Once you have feed the bolts thru put the washes back on and start to tighten them up, but keep the bolt head end still ( aligned with thepaint marks.) and tighten the nut end only (You will see that there is some groves on the arm, which the oval shaped washer sits between). Once they are semi tight, then check the paint marks are aligned still and tighten them up. Tighten up the lower ball joint nut then the main wheel nut.

    These need to be tight, but because I could only get a spanner onto the nut end, I couldn’t use a tension wrench, so just tightened them as much as I could. You will also need to get someone to hold the brake peddle when you tension up the main wheel nut as they are bloody tight. If you find the ball joint turns when you are tightening the nut, jack up the housing as close to the ball joint as possible and it should put some weight on the joint and the nut will tighten.

    The manual tells you to measure from the centre of the wheel nut to the bottom of the wheel arch, but I found this impossible as the suspension is hanging at full drop, so how do you achieve this im not sure. It also tells you to get a wheel alignment which is happening tomorrow..

    Took about 4 hrs all up to do, but could be done alot quicker with a hoist or decent jack stands etc. (2nd side took about 1 hour.)

    Hope this helps.

    Cheers Ean
    This is really good info ...thank you so much

    Swarty

  10. #10
    Ean Austral Guest
    Still works nearly 7 years later . Done the LCA bushes today and had to refresh the memory on how i did it last time.

    This time i just replaced the bushes and depends on how much you put on your own time determines if its worthwhile replacing the whole arms or just the bushes.

    I removed them in a press , but it was a big industrial one so the arms where awkward because of the frame and getting the right size dolly to push them out with was a mission , but got it in the end. I think 1 of those kits that let you do it on the car could be the go , even if you removed the arm and did it on a work bench.

    Anyway , good to see the original how to still works .

    Cheers Ean

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