How hard is it for front upper control arms and struts?

[Granite CB7]

Those bushings need to be set at right height immediately, if they are twisted enough initally, it is possible to damage them when you lower the car down to ride height. I would really suggest taking care of that to preserve the longevity of the rubber bushings. The castle nut and the nuts in the engine bay can be torqued whenever but the setting of the bushings needs to be done at ride height aka jacking under the LCA to imitate ride height w/o the wheel on. I've never used crowsfeet for this set, I've always used box end wrenches.

[zedjr10]

I could not torque them installed with weight. I could not even get an open wrench on them(maybe i didn't try hard enough). I did torque the castle nut on the upper ball joint with weight on car. I don't see how people torque these things installed. It must be just a relative guess torque job with a wrench. Shocks were installed also and car rides and steers much better now. More responsive but i think my lower ball joint is creaking and needs to be replaced.

[Granite CB7]

^Yeah, I could've gone into more detail but I didn't. I absolutely hate setting the front UCA bushings, there is really not alot of room esp with the factory spring. With the exception of big hub nuts, I rarely break out the torque wrench for suspension stuff. I usually find myself tightening them with either my 14mm craftsman 12 point box wrench which is pretty long for good leverage or I'll use my 14mm gearwrench flexhead. The craftsman wrench has the typical 15* offset/bend in it, sometimes its good but sometimes its also good to have a wrench that is straight, so that's why I will sometimes use the gearwrench too. Sometimes there are alignment notches on the UCA itself so you can set the bushings before you install the whole arm but I alway find myself letting the cars weight dictate that sort of thing because no 2 cars are alike esp after 100's of 1,000's of miles plus if the car is lowered, all those bushings are twisted at ride height if they are not reset.

[toycar]

I don't see how people torque these things installed. It must be just a relative guess torque job with a wrench.

Did you read this:

*tip*

use torque wrench + crows feet socket to properly torque the uca in place, just like fleetwood suggested. using the crowfoot is the answer to properly torquing the uca's. fleetwood is talking about the pivot being torqued with the hub jacked up. the suspension needs to be "at ride height" so, the hub/knuckle needs to raise up as if the car had been lowered back down on the wheel.

then torque the pivot on the uca. upper ball joint doesnt matter like the pivot joints do. if you dont get the pivot joints torqued in roughly the right area, the bushings will tear prematurely.

Because that is how people torque them to spec properly. Torque wrench + crows foot socket

[zedjr10]

Did you read this:








Because that is how people torque them to spec properly. Torque wrench + crows foot socket

yeah i read that before i done them but no way was i going to be able to do that even with a crows foot and my gangly torque wrench