Hey, all: This guy at the auto parts place was telling me i would need a specialty tool to remove my inner tie rod. Is this true, or is it not hard at all to do?? I've never screwed around with inner/outer tie rods before, and i have recently purchased new ones. I'm not sure exactly what to expect here. Do i need any specialtly tools for this job? or is it something i can pull off with just some regular tools? any help would be nice, thank you.

you need a ball-joint separator. nothing expensive. two types, one you use a hammer with, and you use a wrench with.

http://images.google.co.uk/images?hl=en&resnum=0&q=ball%20joint%20separator&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&um=1&sa=N&tab=wi

those things.

hey, thanks for the info. The auto parts place i went to also rents out specialty tools, one of which was one of those joint seperater thingies. The guy was trying to get me to take it as well. I was tempted, but i figured this guy was probably just trying to get a few extra bucks out of me........I figured there was a way to get around doing that. I actually have one of the simple ones, the kind you use a hammer with. I'll give that a try, first. Thanks again!

ummm. well the ball joint separator thing is to remove the outer tie rod. the inner tie rod you should have a specialty tool made just for removing inner tie rods. you can get away with using a couple big vise grips or channel locks, the inner rod threads into the steering rack, and the outer tie rod threads onto the inner one. simple as that.

On some cars, there is enough room to use a pipe wrench to take the inner tie rods out, but on other cars, you 100% need the special tool. I'm not sure if you can use a pipe wrenhc on a 240 cause I used the special tool on mine.

where do you use the special tool?
All I needed was a hammer, screwdriver and a couple of wrenches.

It's like a pipe with an adapter on the end, it's weird, anyways, like I said, I had the tool so I used it, but I'm sure there are other ways to do it.

ummm. well the ball joint separator thing is to remove the outer tie rod. the inner tie rod you should have a specialty tool made just for removing inner tie rods. you can get away with using a couple big vise grips or channel locks, the inner rod threads into the steering rack, and the outer tie rod threads onto the inner one. simple as that.

Yeah I changed my outers with two wrenches in < 5 minutes. The hard part isn't changing them, but putting them back on without screwing up your alignment too badly. You can count threads and/or tape the threads to make sure you get it back on in the same spot, but it's still hard to get it perfectly like it was.

Yeah I changed my outers with two wrenches in < 5 minutes. The hard part isn't changing them, but putting them back on without screwing up your alignment too badly. You can count threads and/or tape the threads to make sure you get it back on in the same spot, but it's still hard to get it perfectly like it was.

That's what alignments are for.

Indeed, but that's $50 saved if you take your time and get it back to where it was. You can buy a lot of beer with $50, or almost 2 tanks of gas. ^^

And in 2000 miles yoru tires will have diagonal wear on them and you'll have to spend 400$ for a new set....you can buy a lot of beer with 400$.

Ahh good point, can't say I ever had a problem with that though. Besides, $45 Ecstas are your friend.