What the Truck? Why lawyers should never work on their own cars

Among one of my few talents is a belief that a lawyer can someone fix is own truck. This is not based upon any actual aptitude, but rather a deeply rooted cheapness derived from my Scottish, Mormon, blue-collar, trailer park heritage. “You want how much to fix that?!?  You can kiss my [insert trailer park language or Mormon swear here].” With this mistaken self-reliance arrogance, I decided that I would change the lower ball joints of my truck.   The ill begotten project began with a quick trip to Autozone for parts and a tool rental so that I was ready to make and evening of the project.  I lifted my truck, cranked off the axle nut, despite some rusty bolts, I soon had a lower control arm with a bad ball joint resting gentle in my lap like a new baby I had delivered.  This was going well. 

Now this lower control arm is thick and heavy “A” shaped piece of steel that is about 20” on each side; an absolutely pleasant part to have to sport around – sarcasm intended.  Installed in this lower control arm is the ball joint that I need replacing.  And this ball joint is not just “installed,” that sucker is press fit.  This means it was driven in by some massive hydraulic press or by Thor’s hammer, and not to be removed by mere mortal (or especially lawyer) hands without some big darn tool which no driveway mechanic has. To add to the flavor, this ball joint has been sitting in control arm, rusting for the past eight years. So needless to say, even King Arthur was going to have a difficult time pulling Excalibur out of the sucker.  But hey, I am lawyer.  No problem.

I had rented the special tool to remove and install ball joints.  So naturally I presume since it was designed to remove a ball joint, it could do so, magically if necessary.  Yaaaah, nope.   The engineer in me configured and positioned and studied this sucker for the better part of an hour and finally concluded that there was no flipping way on this earth that this tool could accomplish its intended objective (unless its objective was to see how many Utah swear words I could utter in a “friggin” evening – then it worked just fine.)  Still after an hour and a half of trying to figure this thing out and I was befuddled… and I was mad.  Putting this anger to good use, I wielded my ball-peen hammer and began to beat the living daylights out of this ball joint.  Satisfying and successful; the ball joint came free.

So it’s 11:30.  All I need to do in reinstall this new ball joint and I can start putting this thing together.  One thing that I have learned in working on cars, never think things are going well; because that is when Murphy’s Law will kick in.  I looked and studied and configured this tool for an hour, which could not remove the ball joint, until I concluded that it likewise could not reinstall a ball joint.  Not a change.   So in my cold and worn out state after sitting on the cold garage floor for 4 hours I figured, “I hammered the old ball joint out, I’ll just hammer the new ball joint in.”  Alas, by 12:30 am, with a cryogenically frozen butt, I had broken my brand new ball joint of my only vehicle which was still up on jacks with a tire leaning against the wall, an axel is laying on the floor, and hammer pocked ball joints were strewn about the garage.  Stupid self-reliance.  I’m going to bed.   

Sleep came quickly, but troubled.  I was pretty much stranded at home. I needed to shuffle my kids places in the evening and I needed to have this truck up and going.  So I am going to find a car to fix my car.  Fortunately, I have a great neighbor, Peter Jones, who didn’t bat an eye at letting me borrow his truck when I text messaged him at 7:00 am.  Next I had to find a mechanic who could press fit in my ball joint – not sure I like how I worded that.  By 8:00 am I had found a local mechanic and walked in sheepishly cradling my control arm and ball joint, pleading for help. 

I was promptly directed to a man who looked and acted like the helicopter pilot from Walter Mitty.  He regarded me as if I had just decorated my room with cats duct taped to the wall.  While I know I was screwing thing up, I am lawyer for crap sakes, cut me some slack.  You draft a patent big guy and I give you that same look.  Handing him by ball joint (don’t, just don’t) I asked if he could install it.  He looked at me blankly and said,  “Get a moog.”  A moog, really?   I know I am not a car expert, but there is no tool or car part that is a called “moog.”  The only think I could think was that he was calling me a “moob,” but since I lost weight there be no “moobs” here.  You get moog, you moog.

After looking at me like I was the moog, Brent (as his overalls so indicated) informed me that it was a brand of ball joint. The ones I had purchased were “crap.”  A few stores over was an O’Reilly Autoparts store where the infamous “Moog” ball joint could be obtained.  I popped in bought a couple of Moog ball joints and rented a different tool for just in case Brent couldn’t help me.  I eagerly returned and handed one of the ball joints to Brent, who regarded me like a kids he couldn’t wait to get out of his sight.  A few minutes, some heavy machinery, with a few parting dumb looks later, the Moog ball joint was pressed fit into my control arm.    

I felt relief.  I could take the project from there.  No sooner had I exhaled, when Brent chimed in, “Where is your boot?  The rubber boot that goes on top of the ball joint?”  What?  Boot?  He was right, there should be a boot on ball joint, but it wasn’t there.  Brent suggested that maybe it fell out at O’Reilly.  Maybe, I better go check.  So paying Brent $40 for his time I took my Moog ladened control arm back to O’Reilly.  But alas, there was no rubber boot to be found.  Concluding that the boot fell off before I ever got the part, O’Reilly agreed to order me another Moog and give me the boot, but it wouldn’t be there for a couple of hours.

Fine, I’ll head home in my neighbors truck and wait for my little boot to arrive.  After cranking through a few projects, I got the call, but it was not good.  Apparently the great Moog has a problem.  They forgot to put boots on a batch of ball joint and none were in stock there, but I could pick up one at a store in the next town over.  Fantastic.  I was getting pretty frustrated now.  But what do you do?  So I jump in the borrow truck and set off on my quest for this boot.  Arriving at the new O’Reilly the promptly pried off the boot from a ball joint handed it over and sent me on my way.  Great, problem solved.

I gave my neighbor his truck back, sat down to put this boot on my Moog… or maybe not.  I tried angling it, I tried pushing it, I tired twisting it, I tried lubricant (both industrial and personal), but this hugging boot was not going on Cinderella’s step sister foot.  Now you think I would have learned my lesson, but nope.  I went for my hammer.  Not sure if I expected the hammer to work or if I just wanted to vent again, but after a good beating… I broke my new boot.  Double Crap!  I was also evident that a boot could not be pried off one ball joint and just slapped on by a mere moral.  So I knew I needed to install a ball joint WITH a boot on it already, which also meant that I need to uninstall this ball joint that was so expertly installed by Brent.  There goes $40.  Yes, I am cheap.  At this point I threw a few things and uttered every gosh-darn Utah swearword he could possibly think of – and even coining a few new ones.    Venting done, I need moved forward.

So texted my neighbor – sheepishly borrowed his truck again.  Called O’Reilly – new ball joint WITH a bloody boot this time ordered and arriving in an hour (I think that is British swearing now).   Now to remove the ball joint that I had paid Moog Brent to install less than 2 hours ago.  Grrrrr.  Having returned the Autozone tool that did not work, I had rented a new one from O’Reilly that I prayed would work.  Putting my hammer down and turning my brain on, I installed this new tool and applied my impact wrench and pulled the trigger.  My bootless ball joint fell off (yah, not of that sound right).  But there it was, I somehow was happy to be right back where I started from 4 hours ago... actually no…  right back where I was 12 hours ago.  This sucks.  

So once more, I stole my neighbors truck, I went to O’Reilly and we exchanged a bootless Moog with a booted Moog ran home.  The moment of truth was here.  Could I install this ball joint into my control arm without Mechanical Brent giving me a dirty look.  Pushing my hammer far from me, and giving the new tool a long study, I did it!  Installed that sucker – with a boot – all by myself.  I had crossed that unbreakable barrier and despite the fact that the right side of me suspension system was still sitting on the garage floor, it was simple nuts and bolts – almost.  I did put several parts on the wrong way, several times, but it went together.  I was done… except that I had another side to repair.

It went off without a hitch.  I can’t say that I learned my lesson to not do my own auto repair, but learned enough not to have to ask for Brent’s help again.  But I guess that is me, too dumb to not know what I should do, but stubborn enough to try it anyway.  That’s life.  Get out of your comfort zone; smash a few things with a hammer; yell some Utah or British cuss words and if you don’t end up a bit smarter, you will at least have something to blog about.