jjnmeg

Helping a friend replace control arms and struts on his '03 Accord this weekend. We can't get the ball joint under the hub assembly reinstalled on the passenger side as it is too far out to fit into the lower control arm. The only possible explanation I can come up with is that the driveshaft is sticking out too far, even though we didn't remove it during the process. Though the control arms/strut came apart with no fuss, is it possible the driveshaft came out enough to prevent reinstallation? The driveshaft appears to be flush with the transmission although there is some play in it when we try to rotate and reinsert the splines. Seems like we need the driveshaft to go in at least another inch to make it work. All replacement parts seem identical to what we replaced and we have uninstalled and reinstalled everything three times so I am fairly certain we did something to the driveshaft in the process. Any ideas?

holmesnmanny

it's possible for the inner joint to pop out of place, sometimes you can pop it back in but a lot of times it's damaged and either needs to be taken apart or you can just replace the axle

check the band for the joint and see if it appears to have moved, this can tell you if the joint is out of place

jjnmeg

holmesnmanny

it was the joint in the cv boot that you were fighting, not the shaft to the tranny case