1999 Subaru Forester Halfshaft Replacement

I can explain:

1-This is still a bike blog.
2-I own a car and drive it on occasion.
3-This is part of Why I Ride a bike. Bike repairs > car repairs. Always.


Our car is old. 160,000 miles old. Over the past few months, the dreaded CV joint click began to develop and progressively worsen. It got so bad that they would click with straight-forward acceleration. Not good. Fortunately, I have accumulated some Subaru know-how over the years (this is my 7th, I think, and one of 5 currently in the family).

I found THIS lovely tutorial on SubaruForester.org on changing the halfshafts. As you would expect, I have a couple modifications. I didn't take as many pictures, only where things differed a bit.

Step One:

Find wheel.

Step Two:

Locate replacement halfshaft. (I recommend NAPA. Their remanufactured axles are affordable and are done by A-1 Cardone.)

Step Three: 

Remove front wheel. This is easier to do if the wheel is elevated off the ground by means of a jack or someone strong. The big nut in the center is the axle nut, 32mm. Now is a good time to remove this nut. Leave the transmission in something other than neutral. I didn't use an impact wrench (just my manpower), which would make the job much easier. Just a thought. Also, my new axles came with new nuts and pins (see below).

Step Four:

Loosen and remove the 2 strut bolts (19mm). The lower bolt is a pivot, and the upper bolt is a cam, used for alignment. If you're good, you can get this in the same position when reattaching everything. Chalk paint or something would help make marks if you don't have old rusty marks like mine does. 

Step Five:

The next step will be to remove the brake caliper. This takes 17mm tools (2 bolts). Have a bungee ready to hang the caliper from a strut coil. In the tutorial referenced above, the caliper was taken apart in two stages. This is not necessary. Just do the 2 17mm bolts and hang it up. I do this after the strut bolts because the top brake bolt is difficult to reach with a socket when the strut bolt isn't removed. 

Step Six:

Pop the ball joint. Remove the pin and 19mm castle nut. I purchased a ball joint separator here. It's INCREDIBLE, beastly, and removes separation anxiety that normally accompanies such a task (remember the forks?). Notice that I don't remove the rotor or rotor shield as in the tutorial. Take caution here, as the ABS sensor (I believe) is wired into the knuckle assembly, and could get damaged if you're not careful with handling the now-separated assembly. With reassembly, I used my jack to put upward pressure on the lower control arm, otherwise the ball joint may just spin in place when you reinstall the castle nut. 

Step Seven:

Halfshaft removal. Here you have options. Take this for what it's worth, but I found a workaround that made life really simple. It the tutorial, you remove the airbox and other stuff to reach the attachment pins. The drive-side pin can be easily reached from underneath. The non-drive not so much. 

Here's my alternative. Remove the wheel end of the halfshaft from the hub, then give a slight tug on the entire halfshaft, removing the shaft and transmission stub shaft all at once. You can now remove the pin and reinsert the new pin on your new halfshaft all from the comfort of your workbench. The trick is on reinstallation. Position the new halfshaft into the transmission. Slowly rotate the halfshaft until the splines engage and slide in. The splines don't need to be at any specific rotation for reengagement. They will only slide in about 1". To finish the reinstall into the transmission, align the halfshaft as straight as you can, compress the halfshaft, and tap the end of the shaft with a mallet. Not much is needed to pop the stub shaft back into place inside the transmission. Install the wheel end of the halfshaft and follow the previous steps in reverse. With the proper tools, this will take you about 30 minutes per axle.

Old shaft out. I placed the ball joint back into its place to hold the assembly still and to not damage the ABS sensor. 

Old, dead, knocking halfshaft. 

Alignment pin. My thumb and forefinger.

Another alternative is to get the new pin started and install as instructed in the tutorial. This saves you from holding the pin in place at an awkward angle to get it started.

Everything went really smooth until I had an issue removing one of the pins. Use a proper punch. Or have a loaded pistol ready. 

This is clearly today's reason for Why I Ride a bike: car repairs are torture.