Twisted Suspension

[Nismo_God]

Hi All,

Friday night I tried to avoid an accident and ended up spinning and hitting a gutter, thank god it was at a reasonably low speed. The other car also hit the gutter but didnt damage anything and just drove away. What has happened to my car is the wheel was twisted. being the unlucky person i am the wheel wasnt buckled, part of the rear wheel assembly was twisted. I spent all day yesterday trying to pull the twisted part off. For those who know the rear wheel area, the part twisted is the triangle shaped part. I plan to try and find a wrecked 96 S2 33, an replace the part and see if anything else is ok. What I need help is

-does anyone have a car I can take this part off?

-does anyone know if this part is the same of other models?

-has anyone had the same problem? and what did they do?

-how much would it cost to just get the professionals to do the work?

Thanks, any help will be much appreciated

Also here are pics.....does anyone know how to take off the part in the firt pic? i un done the nut but it wont come off. Does anyone know what to do?

[Beer Baron]

you need to bang it out, or even better use a ball joint seperator (looks like a big fork).

the triangle bit you are after is called the "lower control arm" this will help when you are ringing around trying to get one. they may be other pieces that are damaged too, but not immediatly obvious to the naked eye

[Ant97GTR]

Ouch.....

The part in question is called the lower control arm. I'd take it to a suspension specialist that way you can get the car realigned and they can check for other damaged components (ie that tie rod looks a little bent imo but could be the angle of the photo).

[hrd-hr30]

Also here are pics.....does anyone know how to take off the part in the firt pic? i un done the nut but it wont come off. Does anyone know what to do?

bent lower arm (triangle shape bit). possibly damage to other components such as HICAS rack, tie rod ends (bad news is the ball joint part of that appears to be part of the upright!), possible cracks to upright and damage to upper arms/bolts/bushes (they look OK in the pic, but they should be checked anyway), and cradle bushes. you should have at least a good visual inspection of all those components. don't be too scared, they're probably OK.

the part in the first pic to want to disconnect is the balljoint. You either need a seperator or a ball pein hammer to drop the ball joint. the shaft from the ball joint that goes up through the upright is tapered, as is the hole in the upright. they form an interference fit when tightened up which is why its hard to remove. A seperator is a large wedge shaped 2-pronged fork that goes around the balljoint shaft between the arm and the upright - you hammer it in to "break the taper" by forcing the components apart. The other way is to hit the part of the upright around the balljoint shaft with a good quality ball pein hammer to "break the taper". You will need a good quality ballpein hammer - a cheap rubbish one may shatter with the result being possible eye injury. and you will need to be able to get a good swing and be prepared to hit it hard! with either option put the castle-ated (sp?) nut back on a few turns first to catch it when it lets go. If you don't know how to do it, probably best to find a manual or just put the bolts back in and take it to someone - either someone very close and very slowly, or tow it. its not a load bearing balljoint, but it still won't be much fun if it fails while you are driving it! you might end up having another crash if that happens. Labour to replace the lower arm itself should be somewhere around an hour (it would cost about that much to buy a big seperator to do it yourelf anyway), and up to two if you fit a new ball joint to the secondhand arm as well. plus parts obviously.

HTH.

[Nismo_God]

Thanks heaps guys.....I will try tonight. I always planned to get it looked over....getting a guy to send me up the parts from his r33 he is wrecking.....any one wrecking a r33 in NSW???? Let me know, desperate to save the hassels of courier. Thanks!!