Holy crap, 15 minutes was a whole day for me and my brother. He has a 98 Civic EX and the CV joint was going. We started by removing the axle nut - no problem.. it took about a minute with a breaker bar and cheater pipe. Then we realized that we were on the wrong side of the car haha. No problem...

Went to the passenger's side and spent the next 2 hours or so trying to get the axle nut off. Tried PB Blaster, breaker bar, cheater pipe, 1/2" drive impact wrench, heated the nut, broke a Craftsman breaker bar and the Husky socket - it split up the sides in three places. Went to a tire shop and had them work on it with their 1/2" drive wrenches, a 3/4" drive monster, and a 4 foot breaker bar. NOTHING.

I ended up brining it back home and basically cutting it with a hammer and chisel for a half hour.

The next PITA was the castle nut on the ball joint. The cotter pin was a lump of rust and i ended up having to drill it out. The ball joint had to be jacked up by the stud and whacked with a mini-sledge for another 15 minutes.

The highlight of the whole job was that the axle REFUSED to go into the transmission. The clip looked okay but it would only go all the way in if I took the clip off. I tried bending the clip, whacking, jiggling, and twisting the axle. Nothing. In the end, I put a board up against the inner boot and had my brother wack it with a hammer. It went past the spot where it was stuck (about an inch from where it should be).

Good luck,
rahji