This is a case of muscling it all back into place.

Usually a combo of lowering the knuckle a bit and also compressing the strut a bit.

Somethings to do to help:

Remove the nut off the sway bar end link. You can get the LCA and knuckle to easily go lower.

Take the tie rod end out of the knuckle and move the steering to get to easier alignment. (If necessary, but usually isn't)

Have a thick Philips screw driver handy to work into the strut hokes into the knuckle and use as leverage to align the other hole to slip in the bolt.

Good luck!

 

i don't have a spring compressor so how will I compress the strut?

 

Use a jack to raise the knuckle.

 

A floor jack would be best, but a bottle jack might work as well.

I have used a floor jack for that kind of thing

 

Just undo the sway bar end link, and the LCA and Knuckle will drop that little bit you need. The one nut (and bushing top) where the sway bar meets the end link.

It will be a "DOH" moment when it all goes together easily.

 

+1

Remove the sway bar link and the outer tie rod if necessary and the knuckle will slide up with ease.

Last weekend I replaced the ball joints on a friends Taurus. The ball joint is pressed into the knuckle upside down. The whole knuckle needs to be removed then reinserted after pressing in the new ball joint. Getting the knuckle to slide up to the strut was very strenuous. I threw on the new sway bar links and outer tie rods after I slid in the axle, ball joint stud into LCA, and got the strut bolt inserted thru knuckle.

 

Thank you to everyone who had replied this is amazing lol I used everyone's advice a little bit I took the sway bar link off and just had a friend put the bolts in while I muscled the knuckle down into the flange. But as doing that since the flange was sitting on the CV boot I ripped it pretty good😓 Of course lol now I have to get a new axel. BUT thank god I have my wrecked 5th gen max sitting right beside it.

So so another question to everyone on here. I REALLY love driving stick. And I wrecked the 5th gen about 3-4 days ago. The front frame is bent. Soo what we (my car friends) were thinking is just swap the engine and tranny into the 4th gen body because A it has 165k and the auto is at 310k B it wouldn't be hard would it?

 

Glad you were able to put this behind you and fully experienced the DOH moment! If you've gotten this far, CV axle replacement(s) is not a big deal.

As far as an engine and/or transmission swap, that needs to be a new thread and I also suggest an in depth search here, as they have been covered extensively.

Rock on!

 

Had you jacked up the vehicle evenly, this would be a non issue. Or you could have lowered this side onto a stand, then taken the jack and raised the other side. You would see that things would begin to level out and fall back in place. A little muscle have have still been required, but would have been easy.