I'm a new GS3 owner and after doing some researching, I figured that I better do my lower ball joints since I don't know if the last owner ever had them done. Thanks to the DIY thread here, I was able to save quite a bit of money. I'm not gonna lie, the bolts holing the ball joint arm in place was no fun trying to get off and I had to apply heat to all of them with the use of a breaker bar to get them off. I would not recommend using a breaker bar without torching them up first because if you break the head of the bolt off then you'll be stuck trying to find a new spindle. Here are a few notes for those of you wanting to do this job. I'm sure it has been covered before but this is what I came across:

*You can get away with just removing the caliper. You don't have to remove the caliper bracket. The only reason you would need to remove the caliper is to make it easier to get to the castle nut for the outer tie rod.

*I chose to use an aftermarket supplier instead of OEM because of cost and availability. I decided to go with Moog. Part numbers are K500101 and K500102. I chose to go with Moog because of their reliability and lifetime warranty, not only that, I work for O'Reilly Auto Parts so I get a discount plus I feel confident since I have NEVER had to warranty any of their parts out in the last 3 years.

*After I finished the job on both sides, I noticed my VSC, ABS, and VSC off lights on. I did more reading and some people have had the ABS wire break on them while performing this job so I disconnected the ABS sensors(even though I removed my ABS sensor) and checked them with a multimeter. With the multimeter in the "ohms" position, they checked out fine(1.6-1.7 ohms). I noticed that the part where the actual sensor goes into the spindle wasn't seating all the way, therefore, causing the computer to throw these codes. You will notice a rubber ring around the sensor where it goes into the spindle, mine was all tore up and not allowing the sensor to seat all the way. My temporary fix was to take that ring off and see if that fixes the problem and it did.

Last but not least, pictures of the parts side by side. They are identical and a perfect fit AND, retail is like $75 each or cheaper if you buy online:

 

Thank you for posting this. I'm doing this in a couple of weeks.

 

You shouldn't have any problems. I could have done this in under 30 minutes per side if I had been able to take off those bolts easily.

 

Nice, I recently did mine also, howeveri did mine with oem parts albut I also looked at your brand control arms. The price was about $40 difference, I got my pair of oem controlarms for about $170 out the door. Either way it feels good knowing your wheels wont fall off lol, if I keep this car long enough ill do this along with my timing belt and water pump as maintenance per 100k

 

I just got ball joints for my car too. just 5 minutes i inspected and tried play with them. Can you please tell me if it was to move around the front end while holding the assy in your hand? i dont know how to get this in words. Because the screw in the front could be easily moved on one of the ball joints while it wasnt possible on the other one!!! Help i am freaking out. should i just go return it?

 

I could have gone OEM too but I didn't want to order them online and have to wait for them in the mail. I was getting paranoid because I do have the "clunk over bumps" symptoms. Still, I got away with Moog lower ball joints and outer tie rod ends for $151.

Any screw/bolt that you can't get off will need a torch and breaker bar and patience. Just heat up the bolt for a minute and go at it. Be careful and remember that the screw is HOT AS HELL!

 

Funny you posted this. I just did this today with some help from my dad and a friend. The hardest parts were getting the bolts and nuts off that had become pretty stuck over the last 13 years. We just put a long metal pipe around the ratchet and used it for leverage. The other problem we had was taking the Tie Rod off. However, we found that if we reconnected it to the ball joint, then we could use the ball joint as leverage and twist off the tie rod with one wrench rather than using two as shown in the DIY's found here. We also did the Caster Arms which were a pain. Now I need an alignment and all should be well.

 

Hmm, after recently installing my coilovers, i too get the "clunking" over potholes and bumps so ima head to oreilly soon and pick up some moog ball joints:] hopefully this fixes my problem

 

This didn't fix my problem. I think the problem is the caster arm bushings BUT, like I stated above, I just wanted to do the ball joints for my sense of security. I just feel better knowing that those parts fail all the time and I would rather not have to think about it. I also did new tie rod ends as the old ones were shot. Now I'm going to be doing caster arm bushings next. Just gotta wait a week or two.