Evan, you should be able to rent one. Granted, when you are torquing to something like 110 ft-lbs, in this application, I would not worry about the torque wrench. Get it good and snug and call it good. You don't need to go to spot torque (ie, pulling so hard you start to see spots), but you don't want to woosie it either. Give it a good pull and you will be fine. But, if you are worried, you should be able to rent the torque wrench too. You can sometimes get a decent snap torque wrench for around $50 or so that will go up to 150 ft-lbs which will cover most of what you will do.

 

Alright so I had everything ready to go, rented the fork, and was ready to tackle this job. I took the wheel off, freed up all the bolts and separated the ball joint. But, there wasn't enough clearance to remove the bolt that went through the larger rear bushing because part of the body was in the way. I even lowered part of the subframe as JTIS suggested but there still wasn't enough room.

So I took it to my usual shop and paid the $120 for then to do both arms.

I got the car back and everything is great, but now I have a new issue. When accelerating hard or sometimes from a stop the whole car shakes violently. When cruising at a steady speed it doesn't vibrate at all though, and when revving the engine while stopped it doesn't vibrate either.

Did the shop screw something else up? I'm taking it back in tomorrow so they can see what's wrong now. I was thinking it may need an alignment but if that were it wouldn't it be shaking all the time while moving? What do you guys think?

 

I went in on my lunch break and they think it just needs an alignment. I left it there to have that done so I'll see how it is when I pick it up after work.

 

Got the alignment and it's driving like a true Jag now, glad that's over

 

I'm doing this on the wifes car in the a.m. Looking in there it looks like the bolt going vertical in the rear of the control arm will hit the unibody before clearing the control arm. Is there a trick to this?

 

I had the same exact issue, which led to me having to take it in to a shop. This job would be more than doable in the driveway up on jack stands if there was enough clearance there. I'm not sure how others, including the shop I took it too, have worked around this but I couldn't figure out how to get enough room to remove that bolt.

 

I just got it out...Wasn't straightforward but was not too bad either. I took it loose from all the other points, pushed that bolt up away from where it was captive on the bottom, rotated it up until I could see the bolt hole and drove the bolt up and out far enough to man handle the arm off that last bolt.

 

Just curious, how were you working on the car? On a lift or on jack stands? Even after I completely loosened the subframe on one side I still couldn't get enough clearance. I needed like an extra inch

 

Looks like I need new front lower control arms. The big rear bushing busted today while I was working on my struts and leaked out a bunch of old oil. Assuming the bushing is shot now, which sucks because I've just spent a bunch on my struts and springs and new tie rod ends. Sounds like installation is kind of a bitch too but not impossible. I did notice that top bolt is hard to access with a socket even. Wondering how hard it's going to be to remove that bolt when I replace the control arms.

 

I didn't loosen the lower control armbushing bolt at first when I was working on my struts. That's probably what ruined it...

 

I'm going to be doing the job tomorrow, anything specific I need to know that'll help? Going to be doing this on a lift so my suspension will be hanging. I got the Lowe control arms with the ball joints and Bushings. Any extra advice is appreciated. Do I need Special tools, etc..

 

Does someone have a write up on this? Ice taken everything off I'm down to the here bolts I have to take off, one under neath the rotor/ball joint.

 

I'm in the middle of replacing the front right wheel bearings. I'm having trouble removing the bolt that holds the lower control arm ball joint to the hub/knuckle assembly. Does any know how to remove this bolt? Is it threaded?

 

Once the nut is off you can either pound the bolt out or do the old twist and pull. The nut is all the holds it in, it doesn't thread into the hub, but it doesn't like to come out easily.