911buzz

Hi all, I have a 968 racecar and we broke a ball joint pin at our last race. We had a spare control arm so installed that and went on our way. After that weekend I assumed I could replace the ball joint like I have done many times before with a kit.
As most of you probably know that is not possible with the late control arms.
Since it appeared that the ball joint is pressed in I assumed it could be pressed out and that is correct. But during the press in process they somehow manage to press a small lip of aluminum over the top of the ball joint to capture it. It looks to me that if I can find the correct ball joint that I could use set screws to hold BJ in place. It has a pretty tight fit so it probably doesn't need alot of additional friction.
The original BJ is from TRW but it has no part number.
Anyone know of a replacement BJ?
I will load some pics shortly.

911buzz

So I had a Rennline ball joint kit here and the pin is the same. The brass cup does fit right in but the plastic part between the ball and retainer plug needs the plastic cup to keep everything in its place. The plastic cup is in good shape so it looks like I can reinstall the new pin with used plastic cup and rest of original parts to make this work. This will require installing a set screw or roll pin to provide a non movable retention system.
Has anyone out there tried this?

jsheiry

Company called Eagle Day sold rebuilt control arms and Vertex Auto sells rebuilt control arms. Perhaps you can buy the ball joint that works from them. More importantly you probably want to purchase an aftermarket control arm for use on a track car that is lowered substantially more than the factory arms/ball joints expected. The geometry gets out of whack on the factory arms and puts you in danger of breaking these ball joints. $1500 well spent while traveling around the track at high speeds IMHO Racers Edge or High Strung makes control arms designed for the purpose.

911buzz

Thanks for the info about Eagle day and vertex. I will check with them about a replacement ball joint. With new ones costing close to $1,000 each it would be nice to have an option.
I just installed the High Strung Arms that I had in stock for another car after we broke this ball joint pin. I already had a spare set of stock arms with good ball joint in them as back ups that came with this car. This car is running 18" wheels so we don't

Heres a pic of the current car. Bought this off of Bring a Trailer in April.
have it slammed. These cars are much better if you can keep the arms close to being level to the ground.

jsheiry

That LS swapped car is a "BEAST" I thumbed through the build the firs time it appeared on BAT. They spent a lot of money on that car and surprised that it still had factory control arms given all the other great mods they had completed. I think that I would leave the high strung arms on it and never look back at stock arms IMHO Are those mirrors Porsche original 944 cup ?

911buzz

Thanks, we have enjoyed this car so far. We are working out the bugs after each endurance race. So far we have one first place finish with two DNF's. We had the caster block fastening point fail at the last race. It looks to have been abused during its past life. A lot of fasteners were way over tightened on this car.
Yah those High Strung arms will stay on this car.
The mirrors came from Summit for like $30 a set. They are very light and disposable.

jsheiry

If you ever visit Summit Point Raceway or VIR please give a shout out....I cant wait to see a 968 sneak up on some other fast P cars !

911buzz

I would love to make it out there someday but man is that a long tow from Ca.

odurandina

Yup, i had my spare control arms done,
then swapped them on: a savings of one MILLION DOLLARS vs oem.
and had my original control arms done by them.