04-16-2010, 02:19 AM
Are you sure he wasn't talking about the lower ball joints? They get pressed into the control arm. That's a serious alignment, handling and safety issue if it's bad, but they tend to last the life of the car unless damaged in an accident.
Either way, get a second opinion. If you want to remove the control arm yourself, any decent machine shop should be able to press out the old and press in the new ball joint. And if you can do that part, congratulations — I got the bench vise, and arbor press but never could figure out a way to press out the old ones on my Honda's lower control arms. Even if you bought new control arms with the ball joints installed (no, you don't need to get them from Honda IMO) you'd still come out cheaper than having someone else do it.
So, you have options.
Either way, get a second opinion. If you want to remove the control arm yourself, any decent machine shop should be able to press out the old and press in the new ball joint. And if you can do that part, congratulations — I got the bench vise, and arbor press but never could figure out a way to press out the old ones on my Honda's lower control arms. Even if you bought new control arms with the ball joints installed (no, you don't need to get them from Honda IMO) you'd still come out cheaper than having someone else do it.
So, you have options.