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Hi, I'm Mike from 1A Auto.
I hope this how-to video helps you out, and next time you need parts for your vehicle,
think of 1AAuto.com.
Thanks!
In this video, we're going to show you how to replace the lower control arm on the front
of this 2003 Honda Civic, same for 2001 to 2005.
We show you the driver side, but the passenger side is the same procedure.
You'll need a new control arm from 1AAuto.com, and if you're going to replace one side, you
might as well replace both.
We do sell them as a pair.
12 to 22 millimeter sockets and wrenches with ratchets and extensions, 5 millimeter hex
socket, flat-blade screwdriver, large size, breaker bar or tire iron, flex joint, hammer
with a small, large, and a rubber mallet, pry bar, locking and needle-nose pliers, jack
and jack stands, wire brush, penetrating oil, and we needed a reciprocating saw on ours,
because we ran into an issue with the stabilizer link.
You may or may not need that for yours.
Remove the front wheel, held on by four 19 millimeter lug nuts.
If you have a different style hubcap, you'll need to remove that, but just use a breaker
bar or your tire iron, and just loosen the lug nuts while the tire is on the ground.
Now raise and support the vehicle.
Now remove the lug nuts the rest of the way, and the wheel and tire.
For this repair, you want to make sure that you have your vehicle level.
You need to support, you need to raise up the front of the vehicle and support both
sides.
You can turn the wheel and your link is right here.
First thing we're going to do is just use a wire brush and some penetrating oil and
try to clean off these threads as much as we can to make it easier to get it apart.
14 millimeter wrench, put it on here and turn counterclockwise.
Looks like this is already spinning, so use a 5 millimeter hex socket.
Ideally, at this point, the nut to the lower stabilizer link comes off, and you can just
separate the stabilizer link from the control arm.
Ours was much more difficult, and we wound up having to cut it off, and then we ended
up replacing the whole stabilizer link.
If you do that, we do sell the stabilizer link at 1A Auto as well.
Lower control arm is held on.
There's a nut here.
You have to remove a cotter pin, and then there's a bolt here and a bolt up through
here.
We'll start by removing the cotter pin here.
This is the pin, you just grab ahold of the side, pull it out, and then pull the pin out.
To remove this lower ball joint nut, it's 17 millimeter.
Just remove it that much for now.
19 millimeter wrench, put it on, then use a bigger, I'm using a 20 millimeter wrench.
Lock it in to give myself a little extra leverage.
That one loosened up, loosen this one up, and, again, it's a 19 millimeter.
Now I'm just going to loosen these bolts up until they're about ready to come out.
Just going to try and break the ball joint free, and usually a few good hits from a good
sized hammer does the job.
We're free here, the bolts are ready to come out.
Leave that one out, should be able to kind of move it around, sometimes you might hit
it a little bit, but line it up.
This bolt'll come out.
Okay, remove this nut the rest of the way.
Original part from the vehicle, and the rubber bushing in this one is pretty dried out and
cracked.
The part from 1A Auto, exactly the same, it's going to go in there, obviously brand new
bushings.
All the right mounting points, fix you up.
Reinstall, kind of up into place.
Ball joint on, and just put your nut on.
Push it into place to make sure the font mount is going in, and then push the rear mount
in.
I stick my body against the rotor, lift up, and lock your bolt in place.
We've got our ball joint and nut on, we've got that, the rear bolt in, so we've just
got to get this one.
We'll try using a rubber mallet at first, just so we don't harm our new finish.
Then once you get it in, lock it so you can get the bolt in.
You can take a long screwdriver and pull on it, try and get it lined up so the bolt will
go right up and in through.
Sometimes you'll have to push on it here to get the bolt all the way in.
Now we're going to tighten up the 19 millimeter bolts preliminarily.
In order to hold the ball joint in place while you tighten it up, you'll want to use a jack,
lift the control arm up into place a little bit.
Tap the control arm, get the knuckle to sit down in.
Tighten this to 43 foot-pounds.
Try to put your pin in, if necessary, tighten a little further to open up the hole.
Need to tap it over here.
Okay, in order to tighten the two 19 millimeter bolts, you want to simulate ride position,
so support the suspension.
Get that jacked up so the weight's just off the lift, and we're going to torque these
to 61 foot-pounds.
Used a couple extra pounds, because I had a flex joint on that one.
Reconnect your stabilizer link.
Again, we sell new ones at 1AAuto.com.
Put the nut on and tighten it up.
It's easy enough to get a torque wrench on this one, but getting a torque wrench on the
inner one is pretty difficult.
Put your wheel back in place.
Start your lug nuts, we'll tighten them preliminarily, and then torque them when the vehicle is back
down on the ground.
Tighten your lug nuts 80 foot-pounds, and just cross in the pattern.
Thanks for tuning in.
We hope this video helped you out.
Next time you need parts for your car, please visit 1AAuto.com.
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