Originally Posted by xander_cage

I know, the title is corny, but honestly here's the low down.

A buddy of mine has a 1996 Honda Civic Ex or Dx (which ever is the base model with NO options), and needs me to replace his passanger side axle and CV joint since he couldn't turn a wrench to get his dick out of a vice if he had too.

PROBLEM: I work on Domestic RWD cars exclusively, and have never, not even once, in 10+ years of working on cars, done a FWD axle replacement. The car is a 5 spd, no ABS.

What am I looking at here? Will I be messing with the ball joint(s), idler arm, or pitman arm? What should I have prepared in advance? My very UNeducated assumption is that I will be taking the wheel bearing out as well - what size is the main nut?

I have done a search for information on this - some guys say that the lower B/J needs to come out, some say the idler arm, and some mention neither. The main W/B nut sizes seem to vary from 32-34mm, but I can't logically beleive that an established company like Honda would vary nut sizes 3 times in 1 model year, so what's the actually size?

Once again - thank you, and feel free to flame away on a domestic V8 guy asking such a seemingly stupid question, I'm sure.