Need advice for pressing in axle side UCA bushing for XJ

[bradleyheathhays]

Been replacing all 4 control arms on the 96 XJ and to my amazement everything has gone well so far. Replaced the bottom 2 ok, and the driver side upper went in w/o too much trouble...so but now I'm into the upper arm on the passenger side. Pressing the bushing in on the driver side went ok as it goes into a cast iron part of the axle, but the pass side bushing mount isn't nearly as solid and I'm wondering how this one's gonna go. Basically I'm looking at pressing bushing through two circles of metal with not much support metal in between. And as much force as it's gonna take I would think those two metal surfaces would end up collapsing toward each other as the C-clamp + bushing setup is tightened.

If I had the right size pipe and a MIG I'd insert a small section of pipe between the circles to make sure I didn't fold things up.

I've rented a big C-clamp ball joint 'maintenance kit' w/ a lot of different sized cups from a car store for the job. Any tips/tricks/advice on how to get this particular side done?

 

[bradleyheathhays]

Follow up...

I ended up having to cut the bolt to the same pass UCA axle side bushing, and I'm concerned about clearance issues replacing it with a regular six-sided bolt. Did Jeep make the OEM bolt with that funny type of flag head because of clearance issues say when if the arm were to get pushed way up during heavy suspension compression?

 

[TerryMason]

As to getting the bushing out on the weaker side, you can try putting something in that will keep it from crushing. If memory serves I used some sockets.

Not sure why they used the flag nuts on it.