My sister in law’s car needs front brakes and apparently a new control arm. It’s a 2006 Malibu. The pads and rotors are no sweat but I’ve never done a control arm. Is it difficult? Do you have to fight the strut/spring? I’d like to do it for her as she watches the kids a lot but I don’t want to get into something too hard. Can’t find a video of it being changed on this car online, as is my normal course of action when trying something new.

Thankful for any advice!

I did my honda's last year and the only difficulty was getting the nuts on the bushing bolts off - had to use an impact, according this video, at least on the driver's side, there's a transmission mount you'll need to remove to get to the front bushing; you don't need to worry about the strut.

It took about an hour per side with someone helping me.




Link to original video: https://youtu.be/t6Hf8KjxhwM

Clunking, hmm. Are you sure it's a control arm, and not a wheel bearing?

Just had this done on my wife's Kia. Yep, clunking - both lower control arm and ball joint involvement. Check both while you're in there.
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Could be a ball joint also.

Could be any of the above but my money is on the intermediate steering shaft. It’s a common problem and well documented.

My 2006 Malibu was repaired twice under warranty. 12 years later, it’s still clunking. My stepson is driving it with no problems other than the noise.

If you feel the clunking in the steering wheel, then it is the intermediate shaft.

I’ll have to drive the car and get some more insight on the issue. A local tire and general mechanic shop are the ones that say it needs a new control arm... not sure which side is supposed to be the problem.

Looking at the video above I don’t think it’s something I’ll tackle, though. That fella had significant trouble separating the ball joint plus messing with the transmission mount if it’s on that side...

The stabilizer bar (aka sway bar) end links could be bad as well. This will make a rattle or clunk noise when driving over bumps. Sometimes this can be difficult to spot. If you jack or hoist the car with the suspension hanging free, the links are in tension and the slack can be taken up.