AND THE WINNER IS ?

How smart are you ?

First a comment to Jon: Yes, it is possible to get a split type of
rubber gaitor, but I had to take it apart anyway, and I have used
split types before. They are not as good as the original ones, so as
long as I had the chance, why not install the original part ?

Ok, the winner is Peter Smith, with his very good explanation ( well,
good enough - I add a few comments )

> This was on British Leyland Mini's etc . The centre nut was removed,
> together with the top and bottom ball joints, and the hub assembly

moved out

> of the way, this left the drive shaft end dangling in mid air, the

clip was

> removed from around the rubber gaitor, which revealed the innards of

the

> joint, the joint was retained on the inner part of the drive shaft

by a

> split spring steel ring, this was only sufficient to hold the shaft in

> possition against the small amount of in and out movement as the

suspension

> went up and down, consequently if the knuckle end of the coupling was

delt a

> hefty blow with a copper hammer the spring clip would compress and the

> coupling would come away from the inner drive shaft.

Yes, I was told the same thing, and it worked on one of the shafts, but
on the other, - I just couldn't do it.
I tried every thing I could think of, I made something that could grip
on the shaft and another part holding the joint,
then used hydraulic presses, and gave it what I had - about 5 tons, and
no, it would not come apart. After a days work, I just had to give it
up. I had to cut it off. It is very hard to believe that the little
split spring could hold up against all my efforts !

> It was then an easy
> matter to turn the inner assembly 90 deg when it would all come

appart,

> Clean out, check for wear, fit new balls, lubricate with graphite

grease

> and reassemble in reverse order.
> I don't know if life is as easy as this in the motor trade now, the
> manufacturers probably want you to buy a complete new assembly for

about a

> weeks wages or more.

I tried many times over, and I just could not do what you say here. But
as long as you had given me this good description, I went for another
try. First - the cage holding the balls - had two bigger openings then
the rest. This was the trick. I just had not noticed it. Then I could
not turn it 90 degrees, unless I used some real force on it. After I got
the balls out, I thought it would be easy, but no. Again came those
wider openings to use. You had to fix the inner parts in a sudden
position, then slide the inner part into one of these openings. It was
a kind of puzzle, and I must admit that some clever mind had to invent
this.

Thank you all, I did learn something.

//ARNE