Time for king pins

[Jred]

So after bearings, bell crank and tie rods…it had been a couple months, I took the car in for alignment. The shop wouldn’t align the car as the play in the wheels top to bottom. The play wasn’t there before so now I’m guessing the king pins are worn. Going to double check the bearing torque again. 
Anyway, was just going to buy the entire king pin replacement and swap them out with direction of the fsm. Is there anything I should know about that the fsm or what the fsm won’t tell you manual doesn’t mention? 
 

thanks!

[Gunslinger]

Wear mechanic’s gloves…it’s a dirty and greasy job.  Outside of that it’s a pretty straightforward job.  Another tip…do one side at a time so you can refer to the other side if necessary.  I learned that one the first time I did drum brakes on a car.

[ronmanfredi]

I did mine a couple of months ago.  I bought the bushing/shim kit and after tearing both sides down, I found 1 bad king pin due to a lack of lubrication.  It turned out that the ball in the grease zerk was seized and that bearing/pin hadn't been lubed in years.  So, I had to purchase rebuilt pins and then could reassemble the pins.  During the process, I also bought new upper and lower rubber grease seals for the upper and lower arm pins as well, disassembling both, cleaning, lubing and reassembling.  This is also a good time to set your caster and camber at max with the adjustable upper pin (through the rear upper grease fitting, 1/4" hex wrench)  This will help your alignment shop get the alignment as good as possible. You want the Kin Pin up and down play when fully assembled around .003 using the shims in the bushing kit.  I tried using the service manual to do this when assembling everything and both sides ended up being off, so I had to disassemble them to add more shims to tighten it up.

 

[Jred]

4 hours ago, ronmanfredi said:

I did mine a couple of months ago.  I bought the bushing/shim kit and after tearing both sides down, I found 1 bad king pin due to a lack of lubrication.  It turned out that the ball in the grease zerk was seized and that bearing/pin hadn't been lubed in years.  So, I had to purchase rebuilt pins and then could reassemble the pins.  During the process, I also bought new upper and lower rubber grease seals for the upper and lower arm pins as well, disassembling both, cleaning, lubing and reassembling.  This is also a good time to set your caster and camber at max with the adjustable upper pin (through the rear upper grease fitting, 1/4" hex wrench)  This will help your alignment shop get the alignment as good as possible. You want the Kin Pin up and down play when fully assembled around .003 using the shims in the bushing kit.  I tried using the service manual to do this when assembling everything and both sides ended up being off, so I had to disassemble them to add more shims to tighten it up.

 

Thanks for the info. I’m sure when I read through the manual and get a visual on things it’ll make sense. I also ordered some fresh A arm bushings, while I’m there sorta thing