Last weekend I went to change a torn boot on the right side drive axel. What I thought would be a quick repair has turned into a major job. I tried to remove the steering knuckle to make it easier to get the axel out. Due to age and/or corrosion the lower strut pinch bolt broke off, the lower ball joint would not come out of the knuckle and none of the nuts for anything would come loose, even after soaking in PB Blaster. The allen stripped out in every ball joint bolt. I ended up cutting the ball joint bolt and the stabilizer links off with a sawzall. Okay, so I am in this far, I decide to go ahead and replace all ball joints and the rear control arm bushings on both sides. Crap, the bolt broke off on the left knuckle too. I did a search on YT and found a video on how to remove the old control arm bushing with out dropping the subframe. I have the sawzall, so I'm in. Getting the old control arm bushings out was a snap. It took me 2 days to remove everything from both sides. I had planned to do this when warm weather was consistent and I could order everything before starting. But after looking at the bushings and ball joints it needed to be done now. This is my wife's daily driver and while waiting on parts to be delivered I have to take her to work at 4:00AM.
Tomorrow is delivery day:
-Powerflex control bushings
-Inner ball joints
-Outer ball joints
-Stabilizer links
-Tie rod ends
-Struts
-Upper strut mounts
-Axel boots
-Trip to the recycler for 2 steering knuckles.
About $750 in so far. I am sure the rear needs updating too after seeing how bad the front was. More to come.

 

Both sides waiting on new hardware. The welds on the control arms sure are ugly. I cleaned them both up and put a couple of coats of Black enamel on them.

 

I wonder if a trip to a machine shop to remove the broken bolts would have been cheaper over buying used knuckles?

 

I replaced everything you did a month ago. Ran into the same problem you had. Bolt busted in knuckle. I had a shop try to remove the old busted screw, no luck. So I ordered a used knuckle. Rides like a dream. Remember to check you strut towers to be sure they are not mushroomed. My towers were bad mushroomed. I purchased cravenspeed plates to stop it from happening again in the future.
Good luck.

FYI, If anyone needs to remove the lower control arm bushing. Let me know. I have the factory tool to remove the bushing without removing the sub frame. I rent it out for 70 dollars plus a deposit. Make the job a breeze to remove the old bushing.

 

 

 

I went to the recycler to pick up the knuckle and I couldn't find it. Last night I went and bought a couple of hard drillbits and successfully drilled out the bolts. Today I'm going to go pick up a thread tap kid and recap the threads and I should be good to go. I did wear out three drillbits though at $11 apiece which is still better than 150 for two years knuckles.

 

That's horrible

Switched out my winter tires today and noticed the boot was torn on my right axle too.

Hope mine comes apart better then yours but I highly doubt it with all the salt they dump on the roads here

 

I am taking pictures and taking notes. When I get finished I will post what I had to do and some tips. My job is the worst case scenario!

 

I do not envy you pulling that subframe out. It looks like you have lots of room to work. I am working in a 1 car garage. I used a sawzall with a metal blade to cut through the side of the bushing and tapped it out. You have to be careful not to cut through into the mount.

 

Yeah having a little more space did help. But I would recomend replacing all the ball joints like I did. I found 2 of mine bad.

 

Yesterday I put the right axel half shaft back in and while doing this the outer cv joint came off of the shaft. I took the boot off and cleaned the grease off and there is no circlip to be found. I can't figure out where it went. I only replaced the outer boot and did not tamed that end apart. Struts will be delivered today, so hopefully I can finish this evening. I did replace the inner ball joints an both tie rod ends with ball joints. All were bad.

 

In anticipation of the new struts being delivered today I took apart the front struts last to get a head start tonight. New Stagg struts delivered today. Pulled the fronts out and went to assemble one and the shaft does not fit through the top spring mount or the upper strut mount. Rechecked the Ebay listing and I ordered the correct struts per their listing. Looks like Mini wont be on the road tomorrow. We will see how the seller handles thisa.

 

For those who might encounter the broken pinch bolt in the future, one of mine broke as well after trying to remove it with a breaker bar. I didn't replace the part. I was able to drill the rusted pinch bolt out with a 1/2" drill bit and some patience. Rather than tapping a new hole, I put a long bolt all the way through with a nut and washer in the other side. I believe this is how the 2nd gen MINIs are from the factory.
The second wheel, rather than attempting the breaker bar again I soaked it for a couple days with PB blaster then spent about 15 minutes with an impact wrench before it started to come loose.
If anyone has experience removing a seized outer ball joint boss from the steering knuckle, I would love to hear about it. Mine aren't bad now, but they won't come out.

 

Both of mine were seized in the steering knuckle. I used a sharp chisel and a 5lb hammer after they soaked overnight with PB Blaster. It took about 5 minutes on each one to break loose.

 

I finished the Justy up Wednesday night. What a job that was with all of the corroded fasteners. So, a recap of what work I ended up performing.

Right Inner & Outer CV Boot right axel
L & R Inner Ball Joints
L & R Outer Ball Joints
L & R Control Arm Bushings-PowerFlex
All 4 Struts-NAPA
Front Upper Strut Mounts
L & R Sway Bar Links
L & R Tie Rod Ends
Transmission Fluid-Redline MTL 75/80
Had a machine shop turn the front rotors
I spent just under $800 for parts on all this work and my wife said she was amazed at how the Mini drives and handles now. Yea, it does!

I had to cut both outer ball joints off with a sawzall as the nuts were fused to the bolts. The inner ball joints I removed once I had the control arms off and on the work bench. Also had to cut the sway bar links off. Both Strut pinch bolts on the sterring knuckles broke off. I drilled them out with several Titanium drill bits and ran a tap through them to clean up the threads. I used a 3/8 drill bit. Tapping the drilled out hole was a piece of cake compared to drilling them out. if you have to drill yours out keep the drill motor at a very low rpm and the drill bit will last much longer. I cleaned up the control arms and knuckles and painted them with good quality black enamel. The bolts are class 10.9 which explains why it took so long to drill out. My local Ace hardware store had these bolts in stock. They actually have a huge selection of bolts and fasteners for automotive.
I wanted to replace the control arm bushing without dropping the subframe and found a youtube video of a way to do it. Once the control arms were detached from the ball joints it was easy to twist them until they pull out. This left the rest of the bushing in the mount. I used my sawzall with a new metal blade and cut through the rubber and just cut the outer bushing shell. I then took my 5lb hammer and a big chisel and tapped them out. I bought PowerFlex bushings which are 3 pieces. The Black outer part that mounts in the bushing mount and the 2 piece Purple parts that mount on the control arm. The Black part needs to be pressed into the mount so I made a tool out of 1/2" allthread, large washers and nuts. Then you assemble through the bushing, tighten the nuts and then use a wrench to keep tightening until it pops in. Worked great. I bout a set of Stagg shocks off of Ebay. I had everything back on the car when the shocks arrived only to find the top of the shafts ere too large to fit through the strut mounts. My wife needed the Mini back on the road so I bought a set of struts from Napa(they actually had them in stock). I will say I sent a message to techdeals where I bought the Stagg Struts and they responded the same day. They had UPS pick them up the next day and told me when I had the tracking # to send it to them and they would refund my money. I received a full refund! Good company to deal with. I replaced the transmission fluid with 2 quarts of Redline MTL 75w80 and put her back on all 4 tires. It was too late to find an alignment shop so I used the string and tape measure way to align the front wheels. I found a few videos on youtube and the process works really well. The alignment shop said they were very close to right. Here are some pictures of the work.

What a mess drilling out the bolts.


Tapping the threads after drilling out the broken bolts


Finished drilling, time for my favorite cold one.


This does not look good. Changed the tranny fluid with redline MTL


Outer control arm bushing installed


Inner control arm bushing on control arms


Right side finished

 

Back on the road and what a difference in ride and handling!