This is on my 1990 maxima. so I went to get my front end aligned and they said I need to replace the rubber bushings/ball joints. They also said I had to replace a tie rod/rubber bushing but that’s not as big as a deal. I called the dealership to get an idea of how much a ball joint is and I think they wanted about 80$ per ball joint. Does anyone know where I can get ball joints cheaper? Also do I have to replace the whole ball joint or can I just replace the rubber bushing? Should I get a urethane bushing or just another rubber one? Keep in mind this is just my daily driver and will most likely only need to last for another 4-6 years if I’m lucky. Unless the urethane bushing is a lot better or cheaper I most likely wont get it. My last question is how hard would this be to do on my own. Any other info on the subject would be great.

Thanks

 

cheaper ***** www.internetautomart.com

 

Sweet man that’s a great site. I guess since the ball joint are so cheep I will just replace the whole thing and forget just doing the rubber bushings. I have the Hanes manual and it tells you how to do it, but it seems a little bit more then I can handle in one days worth of work. Do you think someone that has never done this before could do it easily in one day?

 

welcome, check out the FAQs

on my page I have instructions for ball joint replacement

 

I'm glad you think it's a great site.
I built it.

 

Wow. Your the man. I just read through the whole thing and I feel I can do this with ease thanks to you. I will also be replacing one of the tie rods since I will be taking it off anyway to fix the ball joints. Any helpful hints from people that have done this would be great.

 

dude, ball joints are easy. it's a 10-15 minute job with air tools. four nuts and one cotter pin.

 

emphasis mine

 

might as well do both tie rods while you're working in that area. it would suck if you found out that the other needed to be replaced a few weeks later.

 

Well I got stared working on my ball joints and tie rods and everytheing is going fine, but i just had one question about the tie rods. Does it matter on which side of the car the tie rods go on, left or right?

thank a lot for your help as i need to finish this over the weekend so i can drive my *** back ot KU.

 

nope.. just make sure you get the length as close as possible to the old ones, then drive the car straight to an alignment shop.

 

first thanks a lot for the info just one problem there, I will finishworking on my car tomorrow night after i get off work and then the algnment shop is closed. They are then closed the next day it being a holiday and then i have drive to school. I gusse i will eather find a place at KU or just have my parents drive me and then also have my parents drive it to the shop. I always get all my alignment done at the same place because the people there are great and never bul**** me.

 

yeah, sometimes it's fun trying to get to the alignment shop, but I highly recommend not going too far.. Also be sure to let them know the parts you replaced so they don't freak out if the alignment is WAY off, like they did on my wife's car.

 

hmm.. the guys that do mine, can tell what parts have been replaced. or at least they've been able to on the cars I've had them do so far.

 

well sure, but when they stick the sensors on each wheel and see that the front end is 4 degrees off, they tend to freak out and not even look under the car.

 

My guys looked first.

 

Well I finished it and everything seems to be fine. Thanks for all your help guys. Some of the bolts were a ***** to take off! I spent an hour on one of the ball joint nuts. Now for my next question, when I was changing the tie rod on the drivers side I noticed that the rubber boot/cover thingy that connects to the rod that connects to the tie rod has a piece missing and I assume that there was some type of fluid in there at one point. I believe its called the steering rack. Anyway If you guys could just shine some light as to how bad this is or if I should just not care.

thanks

 

Is the boot loose?

 

I didn’t touch it, there is a big chunk missing from it and the guys that aliened my car said that my whole rack needs to be replaced. I will check to see if it is loose when I go home in 2 weeks or more.

 

http://forums.maxima.org/showthread.php?t=335361

Check out this thread.

When i had my car checked out the shop told me that i had to replace the whole rack and pinion as well. After reading what that thread says i don't know if i wasted my time or not. but i was able to notice the difference after replacing it.

It took about two or three days to do it myself, and it was a b!@+ch too. It cost about $300, after core, but i cant remember exactly. The shop wanted like $2000 or something to do it.

If you by a haynes repair manuel it will tell you how to do it pretty well.