My roomate has an 89 firebird formula, and we just did a cam, carb, distributor swap and about to do posi rearend and shift kit. we were underneath the front end doin an oil change and i noticed that the lower control arm on the driver side had broke away from the frame now we have another k member all ready to go in but i cant find any info on how to swap it, my roomate is a collision tech and im an auto tech so we have the tools and common sense to do it once i have an idea of what all needs to come off before it can come out. so any ideas please help im planning on doing this on saturday mornin..

I've never done this before. But i would think you would have to jack the car up and safely support it in a way that the suspension hangs free and there is nothing ounder neath the k- member. Next you would proly need a to remove the tires. then use a coil spring compresser to remove the front springs and struts. then i would say unbolt the a-arms and any thing else attaches the a-arm to the rest of the car, like brake lines, sway bar. next after all the suspension on the front is removed you will proly have to support the engine from either a cherry picker(engine crane) or some how from the bottom. Because once the k-member is removed only the tannsmision is holding it in. after that i would say find the bolts that attache it to the rest of the car.

It may be safer or easier to remove the engine, manly for safety but also for accessibillity.

I just had mine out last winter so its still pretty fresh in my mind.

It would be best to remove the engine, but if you have an engine crane(cherry picker) then you can support the engine from that, but it will be hard working under the car.

1 Jack up the car and support it under the frame rails behind the firewall.
2 Remove front wheels
3 Disconnect sway bar endlinks and tie rod ends, you may want to remove the entire steering linkage for clearance
4 Use a coil spring compressor to compress the coil spring and remove the bolts holding the A-arms to the crossmember
5 Disconnect balljoints and remove A-arms
6 Remove the brake line hold downs from the crossmember and move the brake lines as needed

If the engine is out of the car, remove the 6 bolts(3 per side) that attach the crossmember to the frame rails. They go up into the frame rails from the bottom of the crossmember

If the engine is still in the car, support the engine with the crane/cherry picker and remove the 2 engine mounting bolts. Then remove the 6 bolts attaching the crossmember to the frame rails.

As the manuals would say "Installation is the reverse of removal"

If you do not want to remove the engine, there is a tool you can buy that supports the engine from above while the crossmember is out. It bolts to the top of the engine and then sits on the strut towers. Kinda looks like a strut tower brace.

Thanks i have a good idea of what it takes now we are doing it in a collision building that has the engine brace and lifts so hopefully it goes good. But saturday we have a 6 hour time frame to try and get most of it done, so i dont think we have enough time to pull the engine so we have to do it with engine in. now i remember why i never bought another f body after the 4 i owned lol... but thamks very much

If you have access to an engine brace AND a lift, it shouldn't take 2 people more than 2 hours to change it out. The only way I can see it taking longer than 6 is if you break all 6 crossmember mounting bolts and have to drill them out.

I did this same thing years back when I was painting my engine bay and swapping in a new motor. I disassembled and cleaned up the k-member and a-arms then POR-15'd them as well.

6 hours is REALLY a tight time window. A 2 day period is better. Depending on mileage of car, road grime and rust your dealing with having to remove the A-arms from the broken k-member, getting the k-member mount bolts out, etc. Having to move that a-arm,spindle,strut and steering linkage debacle away from the car. You don't want the cherry picker (hoist) legs in the way so if you can support the engine from above without having anything in your way under the car its best. I'd use 6-ton jackstands supporting the frame slightly ahead of the tranny x-member.

Most of us here take pride in our cars. Please don't be that guy after we tried to help you.

So there was a freak accident that somehow broke the a-arm mount off the k-member. I have NEVER heard of this happening and I would bet some very serious trauma occured to cause that to begin with. I very much doubt it's the car's fault. And these cars are some of the easiest to work on in my opinion.

[/quote] And these cars are some of the easiest to work on in my opinion.[/quote]

Easy to work on and f body should never be used in same sentence i work on cars usually 7 days a week, and have owned 4 f bodys and my roomate owns 2, these cars are nowhere near easy to work on for the most part.. and not sayin i dont like f bodys, i do, i just will never own one again.

LOL, I'm with you on ease of work. I think the 60's were the easiest of course but compared to 2000 and up, I'm glad I don't have to buy 8 coils when I want to upgrade or pull tons of crap off to swap a cam, or change distributors. Our cars are relatively easy compared. I'm happy to have my 4th 3rd gen in face...my current 3rd gen is my 4th and last for sure. After this one I'm pussin out and going either Z06 or Porsche Caman, after I win the lotto, put my 4 kids through college and pay off my mortgage.

Just thought i would add that when reinstalling the a-arms put the forward most ear on first then the rear.

Get it done?

Just wondering what vehicles you usually work on? I am assuming that you are either a Subaru or Toyota tech because in my 25+ years of experience those 2 makes are allmost a dream to work on and easy compared to most other makes out there, actually I have found most Jap cars fairly easy work on.

If you think the 3rd gen F-body is a hard car to work on then I recommend you find another line of work because you won't make it as a tech. there are many other vehicles that are much harder.

This might be a dead thread...the OP didnt seem like he was gonna be back around. Just wanted to say... When removing the k-member while the car is together and driving, you REALLY should invest in one of these. The amount of time and work it saved vs. its cost was awesome.







Also...these cars are very easy to work on... But if I had to pick the easiest car Ive ever worked on...Ide have to say Jeep Cherokees. Particularily the post renix, pre OBDii vehicles. I think like 90 - 95... Talk about a simple piece of cake machine through and through.

Ok..bye..

J.

cool tool, but I would probably make something like it before I bought it. about how much did it cost?

$60 from harbor freight IIRC

$49.99 from Harbor Freight when I bought it... And I had a %15 off coupon...one of those that floats around every other day haha.

Im a DIY guy myself. But this was MUCH nicer than anything I would have whipped up when I needed it. Fully adjustable for any car, nice and powder coated, and ready to go out of the box. Its one of those simple tools worth its weight in gold in my opinion.

J.

Looks like its 59.99 now... like RED_DRAGON said. Still worth it in my opinion.

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/cta...emnumber=96524