Front Ball Joint advice

I’ve just replaced Tifs front brake carriers, as part of prep for MOT at the end of this month and discovered the NS lower front ball joint has got a slight amount of play on it. This could also explain the small amount of random castering I’ve been experiencing at speed. What it the best plan of attack? Is it better to change the complete wishbone, or just the ball joint?


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I had a similar challenge recently during the rebuild of my 53 TF. Initially I planned to simply drill out the existing BJ rivets and replace with nuts and bolts etc.

On closer examination of the lower wishbones the plan changed :rant: as one of the wishbones, whilst looking OK at a glance, actually looked like this:




When I removed the wishbones I found that they are effectively two thin pressed steel halves stitch welded together which you can actually blow air through as they aren't sealed from the elements!!

Given that my TF has only done 40K in its life I would suggest that this may well be the life expectancy of these cheap MG parts.

So it may be that if you're still running around on original wishbones it would be more cost effective, and safer!, to simply fit new units c/w new BJ's.

I bought new units and then sealed all around the seams in an attempt to preserve the internal surfaces from corrosion.

Good Luck

Squashman56

Given that my TF has only done 40K in its life I would suggest that this may well be the life expectancy of these cheap MG parts.



Squashman56[/quote]


Mgtfbluestreak wrote...
...
40k or not a 53 tf is nearly a antique....mileage ain't a sure garuntee it's in good nick..it just means it's been parked up longer than some.

mgtfbluestreak wrote: Given that my TF has only done 40K in its life I would suggest that this may well be the life expectancy of these cheap MG parts.



Squashman56

Mgtfbluestreak wrote...
...
40k or not a 53 tf is nearly a antique....mileage ain't a sure garuntee it's in good nick..it just means it's been parked up longer than some.[/quote]


Agree entirely, given the amount of new parts I've had to install over the past few months.

God knows how some of the members go on who use their cars on a daily basis. Or even worse......... go out in the wet:lol:

I think there is a lot of science in quality of steel....learnt a bit when I helped out in mates machine shop and I questioned why simular lengths of steel had different colour markings on the end....some are made from crap quality and some are a higher grade.....got me thinking how years ago I noticed certain ford escorts of a certain age were better than others body wise...I think it may be down to steel quality at any one time......a bit like the coal on our fire sometimes it's crap and sometimes we get some better .

Trouble is, we don't know for certain which category MG were operating in as they approached their demise!

I'm fairly certain, that given the number of horror stories on here, that first grade steel wasn't high on their shopping list!!

Well worth new wishbones if you have the time, grinding and boshing out the rivets for the ball joint is still a reasonably time consuming job. I have done both in the past, and it may be worthwhile dropping the subframe each side to do the wishbones, if just to free off the subframe mounts and replace the bolts with new - and new mounts if required.
Also for what it costs, new wishbone and ARB polybushes would be a great choice.....depends how much of a job you want to do...the bushes are tricky to push out but the poly's go in a treat!

Sundance

Although the arm seems solid, having seen how quickly 75 rear upper arms rot out, that was my thought to. Just ordered a replacement arm from MGFnTFbitz. Another reasoning was my mot tester loves to see new parts like that fitted, so may be a good call anyway. When I had Tif up on the 4poster, it did look like she’s had 4 new front subframe fitted within the last couple of years, so hopefully 🤔


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The main reason for just replacing the ball joint is to save removing the wishbone from the car.

talkingcars wrote: The main reason for just replacing the ball joint is to save removing the wishbone from the car.

Yeah basically, I’m planning on fully restoring Tif, so in long term and practical views a new arm is best


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When I swapped TF frames into my F the donor subframe had 2 ok wishbones, 1 had a replacement ball joint the other didn't. I swapped both wishbones out for new.