Thread: Replacement ball joint have no splines! WTF!

See this thread for more reference..Replacement Ball Joint Part Numbers (NOT full control arm) - G20.net - Forums

------------------------------------------------------

Ok I am confused!

check out the picture of the valuecraft ball joint I posted and notice at the bottom of the ball joint there are splines which keeps the ball joint in the CA.
I went to Autozone to buy the Duralast version of the p10 ball joint and the ball joint is completely different. There are no splines..as shown below.

I thought it was a boxing error but I checked another store and it's the same thing. I checked the replacement ones for the B15 at Autozone and also at Advance Autoparts and both do not come with the splines. Basically the ball joint just drops right out of the control arm when u put it in.

WHAT THE HECK IS GOING ON? The valuecraft is VA1782. The Duralast is FA1782

SPLINES


NO SPLINES

Isn't that what the "O" clip is for?

I maybe wrong, but the moog didn't have the splines either. Its a press fit, and a tight one. The clip doesn't do much, definitely doesn't keep in place

Idk why, but the cheaper versions have a smaller O.D than the I.D of the control arm. The moogs are normally good.

On Jensens car we had to tackweld the ball joint so it would stay put. If you rely on just the snap ring it will clunk around and likely cause failure.

I just did a ball joint on my B14 a couple weeks ago. The snap ring was rusted to hell and I couldn't open it up, well the eyes on the snap ring broke off. I had to pull the ball joint through with part of the snap ring still in there till it finally popped off. I wouldn't trust the snap ring to hold the ball joint in all on its own.

The ball joint I got was a Duralast unit from Autozone. I was in a hurry and they had one in stock. It had the splines and was a true press fit install with no play at all. The quality was that of the Moog units I was using all along till this point.

Brent

The weird thing is the parts manager at the local Autozone took me to the parts shelf to look at all the parts they had on the shelf. Some of them (both Duralast and Valuecraft) had the splines and some didn't. WEIRD. Even he couldn't explain it. Same story at my local Pep Boys. The only places that has Moog is Advanced Autoparts but from the picture they have on their site it doesn't have splines either. The only sucky thing is that it's a special order part from Advanced.

Before you welded it was there atleast some friction holding the ball joint in or did it just drop right out? I'm just worried about having it welded and relying only on the weld to keep it in place.

I find it hard to believe the issue is with my control arm because it's the genuine Nissan one and I've only replaced the balljoint on it once before so it's unlikely it's reamed out.

It takes a LOT to ream that hole out or expand it. I don't think that is your issue.

Brent

As July 2015 new Moogs are also without splines, the ones I removed were Duralast and they had them. We needed to also tackweld them to make sure they would stay firm. Mi car is a 200SX SE-R 1998

my moogs from rock auto had splines....

only issue i have with the moogs is the boot doesnt want to go on easily ....i had to make a die to press them on