In this article, we will take a detailed look at the outer CV joint of the Niva.
This is a fairly simple material that is often requested not only by service center owners, but also by Niva model car owners themselves.
Most of the questions are asked specifically about front-wheel drives, which makes this material as relevant as possible.
History of the outer CV joint
It is worth noting right away that there is a key difference that should be known to every owner of a standard Niva or new Niva with CV joint, as well as Chevrolet models.
The difference lies in the fact that today's CV joints can be 22-spline or 24-spline, respectively, for vehicles with and without ABS. Production of these types of vehicles ceased in 2008, due to the transition to a restyling that began using fuel injection.
If we look at 22-spline CV joints, we can see that they offer quite a few advantages, at least two of which stand out. The first is that they were significantly smaller in diameter, which virtually eliminated the risk of hub cap breakage. Another clear advantage is that older Niva models were widely exported to Europe, and in fact, these types were exported in huge quantities. As a result, Europe began producing the corresponding parts, which were of the highest quality. Now, however, it's impossible to obtain such parts for the 24-spline Niva, as they are not manufactured in Europe.
You can find many manufacturers on the market, but it is worth mentioning in advance that any production of such parts today is located exactly here.
Selecting a manufacturer
I've personally conducted numerous experiments on this topic. Based on this, I can conclude that while there is a certain, quite decent-quality alternative for factory-made inner CV joints, there are practically no such alternatives for outer CV joints.
The only reliable alternative is a factory CV joint. The key challenge here is to ensure that this type of part, when purchased in our country, is actually factory-fitted, as in the example. CV joint replacement for Audi.