My 86 vanagon has recently developed a noise sounding like metal striking
metal originating from the rear somewhere.  This rate of the striking noise
is proportional to speed and it pretty much goes away when the clutch is
engaged and sometimes at higher speeds.  Having had a look thorough previous
postings for such noises, it is pretty likely that this is caused by a bad
CV joint.

I have not crawled under the vehicle yet but I have read that I should be
able to find the bad CV joint by checking for fore and aft play; I will
undertake this task tomorrow.  My main question is: how hard are these to
change and how does one go about doing it.  The shop manual starts with the
axle shaft already removed - is this a simple matter of loosening the bolts
on either end and pulling it out or is there more to it?  Once the axle
shaft is removed, the manual implies that a press is required to remove the
old CV joints - is this really true?  Are there any alternatives?  If one
gets past this point, are there any tricks to reassembly?

Also, if there is no obvious cause of failure (ie damaged boot) of the bad
CV joint, can the others be expected to last much longer or should I change
them all?

                                                                Thanks,

                                                                Art Beutler