Same story for me, the alignment guy stopped at a tie rod end, showed me the play, and said fix this first. So I did all the steering linkage, side to side, complete tie rod assemblies, centre link, and steering dampner while I was at it.

Check your front wheel bearing play and fix that if necessary too. I replaced all bearings while I was at this job, only one needed it (was making noises) but what the heck they're cheap.


It's actually quite easy to adjust the toe-in yourself after doing this job. I used a string method and got zero toe-in without having to return to alignment shop. Drives straight as an arrow. Search for some posts with my user name, and a key words: string alignment toe.


Sometimes these ball joints are pretty firmly in place and it takes some creative banging to get them out, with a pickle fork, air hammer, what have you.. read up on this art before doing it alone. Resist the temptation and don't try smashing the ball joint bolt out by hitting the bolt end...

In the end I had the alignment shop R&R the center link because I couldn't get one end of it out. I did the rest.

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Cheers!
Scott McPhee

1987 300D