Snap, Crackle, Pop CV shaft. Wife won't drive it

KLUTZ · December 30, 2003

Well, I sure am glad I found this site. This is my first posting here, but I know all will be as helpfull as other forums for my other cars.
I have a 1998 Explorer with 178,000km. The truck has been a gem, so to speak, with little cost outlay since new.
I knew several months ago that the boot was cracked on the drivers side for the CV. now it is making a lot of noise, and my wife refuses to drive it. I just finnished re-building my 2L engine for my TR7, and replacing a head gasket for my daughter's Daytona after being afriad of this kind of work for my 40 years.
How hard is it to replace the CV shaft on this truck? I can get a next to new one with a 6 month warenty for $200.00, and if I can save the labour, I would prefer it.
Any web site that offers guidence would be great.
Thanks
Paul

JDraper · December 30, 2003

Welcome to the site!!!

CV shafts are relatively easy to replace. If you go get a Haynes repair manual ($18 USD), it has step by step instructions with pix. The general way to replace it is as follows:

1. Jack up vehicle and support properly.
2. Remove Wheels (or just the wheel on the side you are working on.
3. Remove brake caliper from wheel and hang it up out of the way.
4. Remove wheel hub nut from center of hub. It's on with a lot of torque, so a LARGE breaker bar or impact wrench is necessary.
5. Support a-arm from underneath. Remove pinch bolt on top of spindle bracket that connects the ball joint to the spindle bracket and separate spindle from ball joint. It's a slip fit, but may take some pounding to remove.
6. Pull top of spindle bracket away from vehicle. Put an oil catch pan under the axle housing/half shaft joint. Using a screwdriver or prybar CAREFULLY pop axle end out of axle housing, making sure you don't damage the axle seal. By manuvering the spindle bracket around (it may take turning the steering and/or lowering the jack under the a-arm) you should be able to get the half shaft/cv joint assembly out of the axle housing.
7. Using a soft mallet or a hammer and a block of wood, tap the axle shaft out of the hub.

To replace cv joint, reverse procedure above. You are supposed to use a new wheel hub nut whenever you replace the cv joint. Wheel hub nut needs to torque down to between 157 and 213 ft lbs of torque.

It may make it easier if you remove the hub from the spindle assembly before you try to pop the cv joint out, but it's not necessary. I left the hubs on last time I was working on the cv joints.

Good Luck!!

Opera House · December 30, 2003

And where do you stop

If the CV is worn, there could be other problems. When you jack up the lower arm, look for movement like kicking in of the tire and the lower ball joint. At this age the bearing hub is about at its limit. These can be greased through the sensor hole. I started out replacing a wheel hub bearing on my 97 then ended up with new lower ball joints and tie rod ends. How are your tires wearing? Hopefully just the damaged boot caused your problems. The CV half axles are amazingly cheap, under $100. So far, I've put $500 in my front end just in parts. I miss those $12 bearings.

Snap, Crackle, Pop CV shaft. Wife won't drive it

KLUTZ

Active Member

JDraper

Somewhat Functional

Opera House

Explorer Addict

Featured images

Featured images

Similar Threads