Continued....
I had to really clean up my nuts with a wire wheel in my drill to ensure the sockets located properly and i had to link two spanners together to be able to access one of the lower ball joints and to give me enough leverage.
Using a wooden drift, and if possible an assistant holding the hub towards you i.e. away from the car, after removing the hub nut I hammered the cv joint spline out of the hub which takes some doing.
I got it to start moving using my sealey socket and a biggish hammer, just wind the nut on until it touches the hub then back off a turn and give it a whack with the socket in place and then back off another turn and do the same, checking each time that the hub nut is moving up to the hub. Once the thread has all gone just use a wooden drift or similar to drive the CV joint out of the hub spline.
Make sure you dont deform the end of the spline or it wont go through the hub and if you get stuck and have to reassemble, if you have biffed the end of the thread over its more hassle time again. I did start to make up a tool and laser do one which clamps to the wheel studs and a big threaded pusher winds through the centre to push out the spline which would have been nice to have.
I then dropped out all the ball joints and twisted the hub right around and out and removed the CV joint from the hub.
Home made syrup sponge and a wet
Now this next bit was a right royal pain and I must have wasted 3 hours or more by doing it the wrong way I think.
Rave says to remove the complete drive shaft and hold it in a vice but I didnt want to take out the drive shaft from the diff as I would then need to replace the seal and the oil but that is probably an easier and better way to go so you can inspect the inner joint also.
The method that worked for me was to cut off the old CV boot and clean out all of the grease using loads of blue roll.
Get and assistant to pull the suspension leg / hub towards the front of the car with a length of rope, and then holding the cv joint so it is straight out from the diff with one hand, let the CV joint tilt down slightly to reveal the inner race that Is actually connected to the spline and give it a sharp hard tap towards you.
I fecked around for probably 2 hours on the first side using a puller I had made which wouldnt not move it and eventually I cleaned out all the grease and removed the boot and gave it a tap and it just popped off.
You can see the groove in the end of the shaft which is where the snap ring sits and it is this that you are trying to dislodge.
Great, Ill do that on the second side, but I clouted the thing for nearly two hours and tried the puller again and it would not shift a mm. I then realised that the CV joint was turned towards one side as I had the suspension leg towards the rear of the car so I swapped it around so the suspension leg was towards the front of the car and driveshaft and CV joint were straight out of the diff, gave it a whack and it popped straight off.
While I remember, my back plates had all but rotted through again so I had removed the 3 bolts and oversize washers so I could rotate it out the way. It then becomes a large rotating razor blade that is always in the position you dont want it so practice swearing at mine now if you like to get it out of your system. When I replaced it I increased the size of my penny washers to the size of dinner plates and I needed them on both sides of the hole.
Now that was out the way I set to work on removing the bottom ball joint. I cleaned up the torx head bolts with a wire wheel in the drill and tapped home a torx driver, if you think the you have found the correct size, try the next size up and give it a tap home as there is a lot of rust around.
Anyway the bolts came out easy. The ball joint however, the manual says remove the ball joint in reality the damn thing is rusted into its own interference fit and is not going anywhere without a big fight.
I chiselled it from the back to try and pry it out, sprayed it and heated it with my small blow torch although oxy / acetylene would work better but I was weary of overheating the wheel bearing and I hammered it while it was supported from underneath by my trolley jack.
When hammering from the top side, try and hit it inwards as well as downwards to stop it splaying out.
Eventually the thing moved but I reckon over an hour a side for me but more heat is the key I reckon. Copper slip in the bore and must use new torx bolts and torqued them up. Had to drop the steering arm back in to stop the hub spinning while tightening the bolts
Clean up the spline and fit a new circlip and boot (I turned mine inside out and pushed as far up the shaft as possible to give more room to see the circlip) and load up the grease into the new joint by moving the inner race to its max travel in lots of different directions while forcing grease into the ball races and balls etc. wipe a clear area where the spline goes in so you can see the circlip to start it
Push the CV joint up until it touches the circlip where it will stop.
Get a flat screw driver and while putting the joint under a bit if pressure inwards, push the circlip into the groove to give it a start as although it says to give it a tap, that wont work with the driveshaft in place as the inner joint just compresses. Once the clip is seated, the CV joint will then tap home until it clicks into place and cannot be pulled back off again.
I used the old hub nut to pull the spline all the way through the hub and then replaced the hub nut just hand ratchet tight as I had to torque this up with a small amount of weight on the wheel to stop it turning
Fix the CV boot clips in place using old style pinchers or CV pliers.
Cleaned up the taper faces in the hub for the ball joints, loosely fitted the bolts in the subframe for the suspension arms, put the ball joints in place and torqued them up leaving the subframe bolts just nipped up.
I replaced my brake pads, wear sensor and ABS sensors; purchased a large g clamp form B&Q to push back the caliper after removing a little brake fluid from the reservoir to stop it over flowing when returning the piston
Disc back on, back plate and dinner plate washers back on and caliper, wheel back on.
Lowered the car on to the wheel to stop it turning and then torqued up the hub nut. Now my torque wrench only goes up to 250 nm and rave states 420Nm, so I calculated using my weight (mass) of 88 Kg multiplied by acceleration due to gravity which is 9.8 m/s2 to give 862 N. The required torque is 420 Nm. So if I am correct in my thinking I should position myself just under 0.5 metres from the pivot point, I actually calculated 487 mm) along my breaker bar and stood on it with all my weight to torque it up. Now its a while since I drank my way through college so that could be total bollox but the wheel are still on for now.
I dove the car up onto my two stage sleeper system to give me some clearance, lowered the car to normal height and torqued up the inner suspension arm bolts to 165 nm I think but check rave and then gave them another ¼ turn after marking the nuts / bolts. Now that sounds easy and I do have a pretty long torque wrench but that extra quarter turn is a lot when you are lying under a car with a breaker bar that is just too long in every position but I managed it using my torque wrench that has a ratchet.
Now I am bound to have missed something and this is my first attempt at writing something up and generally I was smothered in grease so picking up my camera was tricky at times and I do get a bit stressed when things are proving very very awkward .
Hope this is of use to somebody and feel free to point out anything that requires editing.
This is by no way a full and accurate account of how to do the job so if you are unsure, get some help or take it to a garage that knows as these are fairly critical parts to change.
The rave manual is by far the best set of instructions to follow.
In other words, if you follow this and your wheels fall off dont blame me, I am just must telling a story