anyone have trouble with upper control arm bolt?
 

84SD - I only need to remove the driver side upper control arm bolt before I can start reassembling the suspension. The upper part of the false firewall is removed. The vacuum line is removed. There are a few lines in the way including the AC line and brake master. The nut is off and the bolt turns freely.

The bolt only turns but doesn't move forward toward the front of the car to be removed. This is typical of an aggravating but simple thing that gets in the way and I know that I'll figure it out but it's aggravating. More room would help. What am I missing?

My next step will be to go back and consider loosening the brake master to see whether that will give the necessary room. Perhaps there is more of the false firewall that will come out. I'll have to look at that too. Screwdrivers between the bolt head and the body don't help. Impact gun on the bolt only spins easily. Various pliers don't fit. Clamps don't fit.

Does anyone have ideas that worked and I've missed? The passenger side was easy (and fortunately, the sway bar bushings are good).

It has happened to others and there is at least 3 treads on what to do. The last resort is to use a "Sawasall" power Saw and cut through the Bolt or the Arm.

On mine it was the Lower Control Arm Bolt that was stuck but I was eventually able with a combination of heat, penetrating Oil and beating on it. The reason it stuck was the Steel Bolt corroded to the Aluminum tube inside of the bushing.

It might be possible to cut the head of the Bolt off and the Nut end without damaging the sheet metal and then grind one of the bolt ends enough that the arm can be pulled out. But, I have not read of anyone doing that.

If the Ball Joint on the original arm is no good then you do not need to worry about damage to the arm.

It's soooo annoying the bolts are installed in that way. Lots of wiggling and beating on it... I'm assuming the UCA is not loaded. Unhooked from the sway bar? Unhooked from the spindle...

I havn't needed to take out the false firewall before... I've always gotten it out, and snagged the bolt. I live outside the salt belt though...

LCA and springs and knuckle are out. Bolt turns freely.

It is hard explain but the bushing inside of the control arm has a metal tube/sleeve and the rubber is bonded to the sleeve and also the outer part of the rubber busing is bonded to the control arm.

When the rubber bushing goes the inner metal tube can turn around. That means that if the Bolt is rusted to the metal tube and the bushing is no good it is possible for the Bolt to turn freely but still be attached to the metal tube and the metal tube is to large to be pulled through the bolt hole.

I'll look at the new part for details. For the record, the issue is the with the upper control arm bolt that holds the UCA in the body. The access is obstructed mostly by the brake master & lines and the AC hoses.

The rubber on the upper control arm doesn't appear very deteriorated. The reason for removing is how the car was handling and bad ball joints. I decided to do all because the other SD drove so much better with all new parts installed at the same time. I like to take care of the entire system and not need to go back in for a long time.

I installed the bushings in the LCA without incident and know how that bushing is configured. I'll try more stuff after having been away from it for a while.

In the pic of my no good Lower Control Arm Bushing the what is supposed to be a solid piece of rubber sheared into 2 pieces of rubber inside of the bushing.

I stuck some toothpicks in part of the sheared area but it goes all the way around inside of the bushing.

I would have posted the pic in my previous explaination but did not have the pics with me at the Library.

I finally got back to this project. Bottom line don't waste time. Get the sawzall out if the bolt won't come out. There was room to cut the bolt on both sides of the control arm bushing without hurting the car body. Ace hardware had a replacement bolt for $2.69 + .43 for the nut.

The original bolt was a 12mm x 100mm 1.5 thread pitch. I accepted a 1.75 pitch thread and will use locktite. There were no washers on the original install. The above is for the upper control arm.

The lower control arm bolt is the eccentric bolt and came out fine. Getting bushings installed in the LCA was a challenge. I gave my press away a long time ago because it was in the way and not used frequently.

I used washers and threaded rod to install the LCA bushings. Some say the bushings go in easily. Others report that Lemforders are a challenge. I have Lemforders and ended up beveling the ends of the inner bushing a very little bit. I also had to take a dremel with a fine stone to enlarge the hole for the inner bushing to fit into again, a really very little. Then it went together but was still tight. I used a dab of wheel bearing grease on the metal surfaces where the bushing cap goes against the control arm hole.

A relatively cheap 3/4" drive socket (don't remember size) fit the outside of the bushing and was able to press on the rim. I had to make a support for the center of the cap cut out of 3/4" pine. Use an additional washer if needed to further shim and support the center of the bushing cap.

Hopefully I'll get to put the front end back together by this weekend.