🔧 Lisle 18530 Ball Joint Separator Tool Review

Let me say it again, this is actually made in the United States and feels like a quality tool. Also heat treated and forged. Thanks to Revain for supporting American workers and thanks to Lisle for making a quality instrument. Worked like a champ - last thing I'll ever have to buy.

I would pay more for a quality product made in the USA or elsewhere. After taking it out of the box and noticing poor forging quality (was it forged?), I turned the part over and found the "CHINA" stamp on the hidden side. Shame on you, Lyle, shame on you. They are used to making quality tools.

Like everything else it was made in China but was perfectly sized for the F150 lower ball joint. I friggin' threw that thing out and it popped right out of that knuckle as it went all the way in there. I used it again on the lower ball joint of another steering knuckle and it knocked out 2 bolts that were stuck! LOVE IT.

I bought this to disconnect the Pittman arm and intermediate arm from the center link on my Hummer H2. I have previously tried a ball joint cutter from Harbor Freight Tools. Unfortunately the Harbor Freight cage was not hardened so I wasted several hours due to the forks coming apart and the ball joints cutting into the forks. Then I bought this Lisle instrument. I was able to remove these ball joints with just 4 hammer blows! The forks on this separator are so solid they haven't even been…

Although stamped 'Made in China', its performance is reliable (I only mention this because I'm intimidated by other brands of tools made there). Nice to see this was made to traditional Lisle standards many decades ago. I've just used it on 4 chevy pickups by removing the tierod. This gave me a lot of confidence as I pounded hard with a 5 pound hammer to loosen some very difficult tie rods. I recently had an email exchange with a member of Lisle Corp's customer service department. Her…