Acetylene Torch & Exploding Ball Joint
FTE Leadership Emeritus
Joined: Jul 2002
Posts: 42,561
Likes: 423
From: Long Island USA
Very interesting...
One thing to remember, cutting a ball joint like that, you might be taking the hardening out of the knuckle... Must have gotten pretty hot ...
Better to get a cutoff and cut the nut off.
One thing to remember, cutting a ball joint like that, you might be taking the hardening out of the knuckle... Must have gotten pretty hot ...
Better to get a cutoff and cut the nut off.
New User
Joined: Jan 2005
Posts: 19
Likes: 0
From: Long Island, NY
Wow, glad those kids are OK!.... This post just put chills down my spine.... My 2000 Ex needs a lower ball joint on the pass. side. I went and purchased both upper and lower joints, the axle seals and set myself up for one PITA job (both sides). But apon futher investigation, It looked like just the one side was bad and the upper joints didn't show any movement (at least while still together). So I thought that maybe I could get away with only doing the one lower joint. It looked as though I could **cut** the lower ball joint out with some careful acetelyne torch skill and persuade the lower joint in since it installs from the bottom up. Well, I have reconsidered that approach after reading about the amazing exploding ball joint trick. In all my years that's the first time I've heard that !! ....Too bad I have to do ball joints on a truck that has 47k miles on it.
Lead Driver
Joined: Jul 2004
Posts: 5,947
Likes: 62
From: in the woods of MA
Sounds like the prudent way to do that is to drill a hole into the joint before using the torch. I use the torch for a lot of things like this - probably too much. I've seen some weird things and had some close calls, but wow! - never heard of or seen this one before...
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