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Hi there,
Ouch. Unless your $150 was on a early (pre-78) 240 where the strut tube held the BJ nut. Those require the springs removed and 6-1/2 pages in the green book on replacing ball joints.
Later versions have the ball joint attached to a casting, then attached to the strut tube by four bolts. These are a piece of cake compared to any American car I've ever known to last long enough to warrant ball joint replacement.
I think I may know where your difficulty happened. Bentley and the green book both recommend supporting the front of the car on jack stands. Plural.
If you support just one side letting the wheel hang, you'd have to disconnect the sway bar to get complete spring/strut extension. Actually that is the way I do it, because I have air tools making the disconnect of the end link trivial. But the books suggest raising both front wheels off the ground.
The only challenge I see to us shadetrees, is pressing out the tapered ball joint stem. This is not a pickle-fork job because you remove the whole assembly to your vise, or press, or two sturdy bricks, or what-have-you to support the end casting while you press or beat the old joint out. Then, if you don't clean the tapers of grease, you'll have fun trying to tighten the nut on the new one.
So if you have a decent vise and common hand tools, I'd say go for it. Nothing like those on domestic iron.
--
Art Benstein near Baltimore
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