Ok, so after almost 2 solid 8 hour days of trying to get the ball joint into the knuckle, we have been unsuccessful. If anyone is willing to come over to South San Francisco to assist, I will gladly pay you some money and/or beer. This is quite possibly the most serious I have ever been about needing some real help with a part installation. We have tried everything. Removing the strut to gain more play in the knuckle, trying to put the ball joint in before the other 3 control arm bolts, trying to put the old arm back in, using a screwdriver and legit pry bar to spread the knuckle to gain more clearance, removed the calipers and rotors, have tried various jacks, hammers, and c clamps, and definitely verified that we have the correct mk1 arm. This is a serious nightmare. Ford still wants upwards of $300 for their book rate even though we just need one single piece finished up. It would appear that we have exhausted all options.
Can anyone that has successfully completed this install before please assist? It would be much appreciated. Gas, food, beer, and time will be fully compensated. We will probably run in to the same issue with the SVT as well, so this will probably be for a total of 4 ball joints (we started on Denise's car). Thanks guys.
I've also had some people advise to sand the ball joint shaft down to make it skinnier, but I've had an equal number of people heavily advise against that. Thoughts?