E-36 Balljoint False Alarm
by Frank Shultz
reprinted form the "Gemutlichkeit"
A week ago the Independent BMW garage (where I bought new tires) looked at the balljoints, saw 1/8" vertical play and said, "get them replaced under warranty". Later... the authorized BMW dealer said "the joint is OK, because no side play" and showed me another "92 model which had similar vertical play. I wasn't convinced until we looked at a brand new balljoint.
The E36 (current 3-series) balljoints are unusual in that the lower part (socket part) is not connected directly to the lower control arm. Rather it is suspended in rubber surrounded by a metal cup. The metal cup is the part which connects to the lower control arm (I think it's pressed into the arm.) Only after examining a brand new balljoint (by using large channel-lock pliers to squeeze the ball part into the socket) we discovered that it doesn't take much force to compress the rubber, and what looks like "balljoint looseness" on the car is really due to the rubber being compressed.
Remember that these rubber mounts support the full front weight of the car, so keep an eye out for cracks in the rubber! All this relates to an earlier problem of the car tramlining, which appears to have been cured by new tires (Yokohama A509s). I was told by an autocrosser that the original Goodyears wear down and expose a harder rubber which no longer "conforms: to irregularities in the road, thus the tramlining.