deadeyejedi

hi guys ,been doing a little research on changing out my control arm bushings and upper and lower ball joints on the 76 cutlass supreme.was considering a complete set of tubulars as an option as well but havent had much luck in my search.are there dfferences between the 68-72 a-bodys and the 73-77 ?most of the suppliers ive looked at so far jump from 68-72 a-body right to the g-body.

Inline

Hi.

Few links:

http://www.globalwest.net/chevelle-e...obal-west.html

http://www.detroitspeed.com/1973-197...-products.html

Quess theres all you need. Somehow they just dont mention Cutlass, but those are 73-77 A-body parts. I was once wondering too does the parts to our cars not exist until i figured to try searching parts for same age Chevelle. Bingo.

deadeyejedi

Thanks for the reply I'll check them out

droldsmorland

Just make sure the parts say Made in USA or Canada. Buddy of mine, cheap azz that he can be, put a set of offshore A arms on his blown 67 velle. They lasted one week before he lost a tire due to poor welds and Id imagine poor steel as well. Thankfully he wasnt making a pass at the track. Luckly he was making a right turn when it gernaded. The damage repair bill could have purchased several sets of high quality arms...caveat emptor!

76olds

UMI has them for the 73-77 Olds as well, They had welds break in the past and have since made changes. Not sure if I would trust them going forward. I looked at Global West a couple years back. If I ever swap mine out Global West would be my choice.
All the best with your choice. Let us know if you happen to go ahead with the swap.

Cheers
Eric

deadeyejedi

i did look at global west and a couple others they all seem way out of my budget .may just stick with replacing everything on my stock a-arms i will post the end result .

76olds

I put control arms on hold as well with my 76.
I soon found out, it doesn't take long for the $$ to add up when swapping out the original arms etc .
I'm with you on just keeping the stock parts for now as well haha.
My wife put my 76 Olds on a new part diet lol.

Eric

deadeyejedi

i hear ya my budget went to hell on the 72 so i need to concentrate on just what this one needs .and of course more horse power

brownbomber77

I would just stick with the stock stuff and put poly bushings in them. It's cheap and easy and won't break...

deadeyejedi

i know this thread is quite old but im finally getting around to replacing the a-arm bushings on the 76 i bought the moog upper and lower ball joints and energy suspension poly bushings.got one side apart last night .upper bushings had deteriated rubber in them but the lowers werent bad and the original ball joints are in good shape but i got everything here to swap so here goes.gotta say im not a fan of the upper ball joints with the that metal cup, it seemed to slice through the rubber boot after getting tightened down on my sons blazer,hope to have better luck with these.plan is to press everything out and get the arms sandblasted and painted.was nice to work on something 42 years old and not one nut or bolt gave me trouble (but still gotta do the other side).as always tips and pointers are welcome

brownbomber77

Stick the lower ball joints and shells in the freezer and set the control arm next to a register with the heat on. Also, if you haven't started getting the bushings out of the lowers, LEAVE THEM. Just melt out the rubber by heating up the shell with a propane torch until it starts to hiss most of the way around, then push the rubber bushing out. The shells are most likely the same size and the polyurethane bushings will press (with a C-clamp) right into the old shells.

deadeyejedi

Thanks for the advice I have heard of the freezer technique didn’t think about using the old shells I already removed them in one lower . The upper wasn’t too bad . I have to take the other side apart tonight . Nothing easy about this project but it’s coming along .

brownbomber77

Well the uppers HAVE to come out, no way around that but the rent-a-tool works great. It's actually called "Upper control arm service tool" made specifically for these things. You do need to support the control arm when you install the lower shells other wise the control arm collapses pretty easily. Before you go through all the hassle of this on the lowers. See if a machine shop will press the ball joints and bushing shells in. Even for $100 for everything, that's hours of your life and pain you're getting back.

deadeyejedi

I agree on the machine shop advice , I have upper and and lower bushings all out for the passenger side already I’ll tackle the drivers side tonight .the arms are in great shape so not dealing with rusted in stuff

brownbomber77

Well...42 years is a long time to be somewhere...rust or not...ha

deadeyejedi

You got that right !

deadeyejedi

made a little progress but got sidetracked with two big snow storms .managed to get the arms cleaned and painted and installed the upper ball joints and bushings.gotta try the lowers today maybe my crude benchtop press will help,still trying to work the bugs out of it.bushings are in the freezer now.

deadeyejedi

just finishing up this project glad to have everything nice and tight up front .this is not a job for the faint at heart.i did it all with hand tools and my vice ,the home made press did ok on a couple bushings but failed on the lower ball joints.reinstalling the springs was a nightmare took me nearly two hours per spring.had to compress them to dangerous levels to finally get them in.tonight finish up the shocks and grease everythimg and do finally tightening of the lower control arms at ride hieght.this was one of those jobs that was much easier taking apart the old stuff than putting in the new.

brownbomber77

Crap, I forgot to give unsolicited advice on the springs....


Run a chain through the 2nd to bottom coil and through the top up and over the frame
Connect the two ends with a bolt
Hook the non crank end of the come along to the chain and the crank end to the frame hole on the other side of the car.
Have a jack under the ball joint when possible
Pull the spring with the come along into the control arm
Jack up the control arm from under the spring pocket until the spring is close to being seated.
Keep drawing the spring into the pocket with the come along until it's seated

deadeyejedi

Thanks brown bomber it’s all water under the bridge now . I’ll say it took a few minutes to envision your method but would be safer than leaning over and handling that compressed spring