Upper control arm question

[jfaabody]

I know the 72-73 upper ball joints are different, but are the arms different too.? Can I just swap the ball joints and not the arms

 

[ardentindustries]

The threaded portion of the control arms, which the ball joints thread into, are different size. Therefore, an "early" ball joint, wont thread into a "later" control arm. To answer your question simply, no you cannot swap ball joints without swapping the arms.

 

[72bluNblu]

The '73 up control arms use bigger ball joints. That refers not only to the taper on the shaft, but also to the diameter of the ball joint itself.

So, if you're looking to upgrade to bigger ball joints to do a disk brake swap, you'll need the entire arm. You can keep the upper control arms and ball joints if you use a spacer on the ball joint to use the later spindles with the earlier uppers. Cass (Dr. Diff) was selling a tapered adaptor that you can use to run the later spindles with the small ball joint uppers. Here's a link to his auction...

http://www.ebay.com/itm/67-72-Mopar-A-body-upper-ball-joint-tapered-adapters-/180873312601?pt=Motors_Car_Truck_Parts_Accessories&hash=item2a1ce3b959#ht_500wt_1156

 

[Jim Lusk]

You can also get some ball joint sockets that can be welded to the arm, but you'll need to cut out the old part. If I were going that route I would move the socket a little farther forward to gain caster. I don't think I would attempt this without some sort of jig.