I have used that tool on my PORSCHE, Lotus, G35 and my daughter Honda Fit and the wife’s minivan with no problems. Perhaps the other user that used that tool bought a cheap tool or didn’t know how to use it. My tool was made by OTC.

My ball joints were new. I installed them three weeks prior. With the X5 on ramps, the left one popped off with 2 hammer hits. The right ball joint side was on tighter. I removed the ball joint so I wouldn't have to take the wheel off. For installation, I took off both wheels. I turned the ball joint so could insert the cotter pin with wheels on. Once the the arm was in place (loosely), I put the wheels with full weight to snug them up. I then removed the ramps and drove it a few feet back and forth. With full weight and settling, I tightened them using my 1/2" ratchet.

Spec on rear camber is -1.5 to -2.1° they are supposed to lean in on top enough to "look broken".

Inner edge rear tire wear comes from the ball joint and/or the outer joint of the rear control arm (aka wishbone) the car can have 3+ degrees of neg. camber with no appreciable tire wear.

Interesting, I'll have to put my iPhone on the wheels. The rear inner wear is not too noticeable. Even without rotation. The cheap tires have 10,000 plus miles. The previous owner had free rotations and balance but didn't do it according to records at Discount Tire. I can move rear suspension maintenance down the list if it's within specs. The shocks have to go though.

Take a photo from far behind (to remove parallax), and post it. I can measure the angles with Photoshop far more reliable than iPhone level (though I used to check mine occasionally that way).

The inner tire wear from the worn joints will be much more extreme with wider tires. My 255s lasted 2 weeks once I noticed the fast image wear. My 235s lasted 4 months. (the preload on the joint pushed the opposite direction)

The tool already came this morning. It's beefier than other ball joint separators I've used in the past.



https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...a6de4cb4bc.jpg


From Amazon, made by Gearwrench - https://www.amazon.com/GEARWRENCH-39...4820720&sr=8-6

I recommend using it to pretension and hit the arm with a hammer vs. just the tool. I broke the end of a steel prybar and broke the fork off my new picklefork in the process. You will prevail.

Hopefully since I already hit it with PB blaster it will come apart without too much drama, but I understand what your saying... I'll get at it next weekend.



Thanks for the insight and taking the time to post your experience on completing this job.

Heating to 600F and pb and time didn't help just more pounding until it came off.

Actually I recall what finally worked and may play into your fix;

I already had the fork part of my pickle fork broken off in the joint pushing a few thousand pounds of force maybe 8-10000.

I then used the handle of the picklefork that broke off (moral of the story: only hit on the handle axis don't pry sideways).

I used the handle as a very large drift pin and I could hit the tension strut from above the brake disk! That gave me much much better hammer swing!

If the thing doesn't pop off with relative ease, tension with the new tool good and snug: limit torque using a reasonable size wrench not a long breaker bar then copy my drift pin concept so you can apply the strikes much more effectively.

Did you say you already changed the ball joints? That same method is how I removed the swaged in ball joints.

I haven't changed out the ball joints. I thought about doing those too and not bother separating the ball joint from the thrust arm. Then I read more posts about the ball joints being a PITA to remove because they get rusted in place often.



Good news is this car has been in CA all its useful life and away from the ocean. We are second owners and picked it up at the end of a lease.



I haven't encountered any rust anywhere on the vehicle. It's garaged too, so even the paint looks great after 18 years.