I haven't seen an answer to OP's question. All those tools mentioned except the BMW special tool in prior replies will fail doing this job. The ball joint is not machine pressed in. It's pressed in while you tighten up those 2 bolts that hold it. So, it's still a pressure fit. Don't think about removing them by hands after removing those 2 bolts. Weasel pointed out one tip - make sure your socket has good grip on the bolt. They're very easy to be damaged. It sucks when that happens.

The BMW special tool is actually similar to slide hammer. I don't think you want to spend that money on this tool (a couple hundreds). Now, here is the tip you need. Cost of this solution could be $0 if you can rent them from local autozone. If you want to own the tools, get them from place like harborfreight for cheap. 2 things you need - slide hammer(like http://www.tooldesk.com/images/close...TD-3045_lg.jpg 3lbs one is good enough) and tied rod/pitman arm puller(like http://4x4icon.com/offroad/063007_st...2645_small.jpg).

Put the pitman arm puller as the attachment on your slide hammer. Leave thrust arm on the ball joint but remove 2 bolts holding ball joint to the steering knuckle. The just use the pitman arm puller on your slide hammer to hold between thrust arm and ball joint. Give it about 2 strikes and ball joint should come off. If the ball joint is heavily rusted, spray something like WD40 or PB Blaster and give it a few strikes. Leave it there to let the fluid penetrate thru. Give it a try after a couple minutes and it should do the trick.

Here is another tip. Make sure you get the alignment done after replacing the arm.

Those mechanics in dealership should be capable of removing the damage bolts. I'm surprised that they couldn't figure out. Maybe the guy who's working on your car is new.

Depending how bad it is, most of time, impact driver and bolt extractor can take care of it. Worst case is to drill the old damaged bolt out. Try not to damage the thread. If thread is damaged, you will have to tap new thread or replace the steering knuckle.

flyingmachine, thanks for the tip. I think I need to make a trip to harborfreight this weekend :)

Did both sides tension struts and ball joints this Sunday. The bushings were really worn out and cracked. It went pretty well. It took me 1h30mns to do both sides including jacking up the car and I really took my time. I first removed the front big bolt (it is a 21 metric). I used a flat 21 metric wrench on the inside to hold the nut and a 21 socket with a long lever arm wrench on the other side. I then removed the ball joint side of the arm using a torx inverted socket. The 2 torx bolts that hold the ball joints are not very deep so you really need to be sure that your inverted socket has good grip on the bolts in order not to strip them as Weasel and Flyingmachine mentioned quite rightly. You need to turn the wheel in between the first and second bolt to have a good access to them. I rented a slide hammer at Autozone but never had to use it. The ball joints came pretty easily with just some slight hammering on the tension arm that I kept attached to the ball joint. Since I was replacing both the arm and ball joint I did not need to remove the old ball joints from the old arms but I did remove one to see how difficult it was. With a Pitman arm puller it came out very easily.
Now the results. The X drives better now. It has a better and more sturdy feeling.:thumbup: However I still have a clunk/rubbing noise though that is obviously not coming from the tension arm bushings or ball joints unlike I initially thought :(. It makes more of a clunking sound when driving even on flat surfaces and it makes a kind of rubbing sound when turning wheels when the car is not moving. I believe both sounds to be related to the same problem but I may be wrong. All other components of the suspension (controls arms, tie rods, swing arms, etc..) seem in really good shape from what i can see. I got some of the suspension components (tie rods and swing arms) replaced under the extended warranty 4 years ago and less than 45k miles ago. I am now wondering if this is not coming from the sway bar bushing. I will spend more time next weekend to try to identify where this sound is coming from.

Make sure you correctly pre-loaded those thrust arm bushes or they will fail inside 10,000m!

With a clunk and a stationary creak I would check those top strut mounts. Have you done the sway bar drop links yet?

X5Girl, xxx

man, I tried to take out the balljoints using a cheapo slide hammer and I stripped the threads attached to the pitman arm puller. The joints were stuck on there pretty good.

Top strut mounts is also a good suggestion. I had similar issues with my E39 540 and E46 M3. Easy check and fix.

Yes I had the car on its wheels before tightening them. What do you call the sway bar drop links? Are these the swing bars or swing supports? They look really good and have no play. I think they must have been changed when several components of suspension were changed during the extended warranty. They look too good for 109k miles. Actually most of the suspension components look good for that mileage. The tension arm bushings were the only obvious components that were warn out. Even the two ball joints that I changed did not look bad at all and had no obvious play.

handy thread

getting the ball joints out
 

I had no room for a slide hammer. I first grinded down an old screw driver to razor sharp and tried to chisel, it only bent it open-but enough to get some penetrating oil in. Then I used a breaker bar with a 8 foot galvanized pipe-wedged it between the re-attached control arm and lifted-still did'nt come easy put popped out. Did drivers side first (someone should say-you need to drop the front bumper and loosen the air vent to get the the bolt out and I needed the room to get my torque wrench in). I was hoping the pass. side would be eaier-but it was harder, I felt too much stress when lifting the par bar so I again chisled a little to get some pen. oil under and inbetween. WORSE part- I still have my shimmy when braking. I first thought warped front rotors, changed them, now I will try changing the rear rotors.
ORDER new screws for the ball joint, they are easy to mess up. My ball joints came with new screws, but they were not the same.....

read someone say it took them an hour and half?? It took me about 8 hours with a lunch brake and dog walk included. I took off the wheels rotors and dust sheild, you could probably do it with the wheel on, but at first try I got a "slip" on the ball joint bolt and wanted a good grip and look.





The BMW special tool is actually similar to slide hammer. I don't think you want to spend that money on this tool (a couple hundreds). Now, here is the tip you need. Cost of this solution could be $0 if you can rent them from local autozone. If you want to own the tools, get them from place like harborfreight for cheap. 2 things you need - slide hammer(like http://www.tooldesk.com/images/close...TD-3045_lg.jpg 3lbs one is good enough) and tied rod/pitman arm puller(like http://4x4icon.com/offroad/063007_st...2645_small.jpg).

Put the pitman arm puller as the attachment on your slide hammer. Leave thrust arm on the ball joint but remove 2 bolts holding ball joint to the steering knuckle. The just use the pitman arm puller on your slide hammer to hold between thrust arm and ball joint. Give it about 2 strikes and ball joint should come off. If the ball joint is heavily rusted, spray something like WD40 or PB Blaster and give it a few strikes. Leave it there to let the fluid penetrate thru. Give it a try after a couple minutes and it should do the trick.

Here is another tip. Make sure you get the alignment done after replacing the arm.[/QUOTE]