Art-
You forgot to remove the camera from the wheel well, I bet. That would give you plenty more room ;) Or perhaps the complete lack of the red oxide material you show (what the heck is that stuff?) provides enough clearance. But I have never had a problem stepping down on the strut assembly to coax it out of the tower. Enough force does it for me every time, maybe I bend something. I just never noted any correlation with ball joints, using Mehle, TRW of Volvo interchangeably.