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Well I was backing out of my parking spot at work and I hear, POP. Well what was that... Hit the brakes and I hear tire rub. Hmmm get out and sure enough tire in the bumper. So for $56 I ordered one from O'Reilly while I'm waiting for my brother to show up with the trailer.... Since I'm at work, I already soaked the bolts with PB lol.
Im just glad it happened here and not on the highway doing 65.
Radius arm
the hardest part was getting the top stud out of the radius and ttb arm I should have taken a pic before I wire wheeled it, but it was coated in blue loc-tite. Don't know if that's factory... But it made it a gigantic PITA. Started at 0600 and had it out at 0650, now just waiting a half hour for the parts store to open
I just put new bushings in mine a month ago. I was surprised to see how crusty it was compared to the ones on my '69 F100 that are twice as old. The new versions are pretty flimsy compared to the cast pieces of the 60's.
That's no lie, I've done several SAS D44 swaps into Brick and OBS trucks and just feel better about the heavier build of the solid axle arms. Even after years of mud, creek water and river bottoms they never look as bad as this daily driver of mine.
Well, update, I finished it a bit before 11am yesterday. And I must say it rides way better. I think with the fracture line as thin as it is, the truck has been sagging slowly and I never really noticed it.
So starting at 0445 taking a breakfast break at 0530-0600 for mom and pop diner Biscuits'n'Gravy (my hours at work don't normally allow for a regular breakfast and if you ever go through Chillicothe, IL stop at Track Inn). It took about 4.5 to 5 hours. The majority of that was fighting the radius arm to ttb 1-1/8 bolts out, man even with PB it was a bear to twist them loose. Especially, the top one with the bolt for retaining the coil spring. The stud on top was too long for any of my deep wells, so I used one of the sockets for my 1-3/4 drive gun with a pipewrench and 6 foot piece of exhaust as a cheater pipe. Just the top one took an hour and ten minutes.
Back in the mid 90's when I worked at the Ford dealer we did radius arm bushings all the time. I still have the extra deep socket I bought to do the job. I believe the top stud (and lord bolt) had did have thread locker on it from the factory.
