Front Suspension rebuild

[RFaber]

Well, here are the pics (some) of my total redo of my X5's front suspension. I have to thank some of you here for the tooling ideas. I took an cv axle nut and ground it down to make a puller to pull the axle back into the hub, worked flawlessly!!
first pic is shot of the tools i used to "fabricate" my axle puller. i know i missed all the removal stuff, but i think that the removal parts have been covered by other posters a fair bit, so i was just adding the "new" stuff.
second pic is my puller in action, i used a small bar of 5/8 square stock to act as a bridge to pull against. i fabed up some pliers to act as an industrial snap ring pliers and to fit the grooves in the axle nut that i made up.
third one is my method of removing the front wheel bearing, using a large socket that fit the back of the bearing, (ironically it was an impact socket) the hub came out in a similar fashion.
I pounded it out quite easily, the first side came out cleanly, the hub only the bearing remained intact. the second the bearing split apart about half way off) hence pic number four, the method i used to pull off the bearing off the hub,
the fifth pic is my ball joint box, wondering what this means!! lol, so i put on my overalls, turned my hat sideways and grabbed a really large wrench. didnt feel any different so i carried on!
i took a vice off my bench, put in two ball joint sleeves, and managed to push out the tension strut bushing in a couple herculean twists of the handle! (an 8 foot bar allowed me to feel like a greek superhero for a moment!!) i used a buddies shop press to push in the new bushings. (dont forget to align the arrows with the marks on the tension rods!!! and yes, that is ice on the ground!!)
pressed in the wheel bearings in the press too. and all was good!

this was my epic weekend with my X5 now she drives like a dream