55 T'bird repoduction ball joint problems

55birdman

55birdman

Active Member
Last seen
Joined
Sep 16, 2016
Thunderbird Year
1955
I recently ordered a complete set of replacement ball joints for my '55.
Very briefly; they don't fit being too thick (~.06 -.12") and were supplied with metric hardware!
The vendor willingly replaced them but these are identical to the first batch.
What I'm seeing is that the faces of the bolt holes are not finished/machined. Looking at the pictures of these ball joints from many other vendors, regardless of price, and they vary greatly, none appear to be as the originals on which all mounting surfaces were machined.
I wonder if anyone else has run into this issue and can reccomend a source of OEM-like units?
 
what do you mean, too thick?
The ‘lugs’ where the bolts go through are taller than the originals. This area must fit into the ‘C’ shaped opening in the control arms and they will not. I’ve had to machine as much as 1/8” off. The lowers ones were worse than the upper.
 
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