how do you seperate the front lower ball joint?

[wutangben]

hey, i'm trying to replace my lower control arm and i can't figure out how to seperate that ball joint. i've tried using pickle forks but they weren't wide enough. also tried a pitman arm puller that i use on my hondas, but the arms dont have enough space inbetween them.

can someone help me out, asap?

thanks

[ultraprince]

did you try a ball joint seperator? if that's what you mean by pikkle fork. but i beat the hell out of the fork until it came off. but at the same time i tore up my ball joints.

[wutangben]

yeah but the distance between the two things i need to seperate is bigger than the width of my widest pickle fork. if i put two pickle forks in, as i hammer one in, it just force the other one out. i tried hammering also, but the problem is that the lower control arm is already disconnected everywhere else, so i don't have anything to hold the assembly still. i'm pulling it from this horrible junkyard here at home.

here's a pic for those who don't know what i'm talking about.
http://importnut.net/240pics/brake_upgrade/brakeswap099.JPG
it's the bolt that is going upwards with a 22mm nut on the end.

[andrave]

undo the bolt, take the spindle off, that will give you more room to work with (and also require you to unbolt the caliper. tape or secure it up out of the way where it wont pull on the brake lines, which weakens them).

There is a fork that will fit them (we have one somewhere) but once you take the spindle off the ball joint, you can simply take the control arm off (you said you are replacing it) and put it in a vice, which will give you more leverage.

If you haven't bought your control arms yet, check out PDMracing.com, I needed new ball joints and it was actually cheaper for me to buy new control arms with balljoints installed than it would have been to simply replace the ball joints.
That would take care of both your problems.