The worst ones I ever bought were new. Rebuilt is the way to go.

 

Just finished replacing defective CV axle. Detroit Axle agreed to send me a new one in exchange for deposit that will be refunded when they get the damaged one back.


This time I used a slide hammer that I loaned from a nearby AutoZone and a neat attachment made out of 1/8" cable. I saw a guy on YouTube use similar method.

The slide hammer needs to come with attachments. I used the one shown in the pictures to connect the slide hammer to the wire rope.




Here are some details. It cost me about 5$ for 8' of wire rope and additional accessories. It took me several minutes to put everything together and about 3 hits with the slide hammer to get the axle out. So much easier than all the other methods that I have tried before.


Here are the things that I got for construction of the slide hammer attachment. On the right is the muffler clamp that I used to remove the inner stab shaft from the CV axle. AutoZone sells them for about $2.


Here it is in action. The trick is to leave the muffler clamp a bit loose so you can rotate it around the shaft. That way you can hit it with a hammer from several locations. If you tighten it all the way you will only be able to hit it at the two locations where the nuts are.

The axle's female end and the shaft's male end that is covered with a sleeve are joined together pretty tight. It is not only the retaining clip that you have to knock out of the groove, the whole shaft has to SLOWLY and GRADUALLY be knocked out of the axle.


Here is another view. The sleeve that is on the shaft seats against the rubber seal in the transmission casing. One has to be careful to position the clamp in such a way that the walls of the sleeve are not damaged. In other words, the part of the clamp that is tightened with two nuts should seat right on the edge of the sleeve.


Here is the shaft assembly. The clamp goes on top of the rubber edge of the sleeve. The rubber is not damaged in the process.

Thanks donbrew for advice on using the muffler clamp!

 

Great pics - thanks for the update and description of the process - that will certainly help another member out down the road.

 

When I "invented" the muffler clamp tool it was pretty much half baked. I'm glad you figured out what I meant and showed us how.

 

We will now commence calling muffler clamps Don circle vices, naw! But great use of what you have to work with Don, and explaining it for slonny to use the method!

 

That's a lot of work and money to have not spent a bit more and got it did correctly! control arms are the heart of your suspension, if you can,t afford the correct part at least replace the bushings and ball joint back on the original metal! There is a reason why sellers like Detroit Axle can sell as cheaply as they do however it is not to your benefit!as anyone can pull and replace parts not everyone has knowledge about the parts they're pulling and replacing.

 

This is about axles , not LCA’s, did you mean to post in a different thread about Stamped steel LCA’s?