Maybe these couple of assembly line photos will help to at least determine if (some) of the assembly line cotter pins were neatly bent using engineering standards (which some pre-assembled components may have been done off of the assembly line?) or if some of the cotter pins were just slipped in and tapped with a hammer or tool? I'm thinking the worker that used the pneumatic air gun (in the photo) to install the ball joints etc. was the same worker that may have inserted the cotter pin otherwise if the castle nut didn't align with the ball joint hole the next worker would have to have an equally powerful air gun or long lever wrench to align it. Don't know how many times we all have had to do that eh? So now the worker with the air gun tightens the castle nut, slips in the cotter pin and taps it with the socket end of the air gun and moves on......that's my bs assumption and you know what they say about assumptions

Edit: Looking at the assembly line photos there seems to me to be only two cotter pins that need to be installed at this point; the two upper "A" arm ball joints, most or all of the other cotter pins should have already been installed off of the assembly line where the entire drive line was assembled??? To answer the original question you would have to reference those two cotter pins IMO. Then compare the other cotter pin locations and see if they follow a different pattern. All cotter pin bending were therefore not done the same way in my opinion now again only my opinion.

(BTW that's one heck of a pneumatic tool being used to tighten what looks like the K-frame bolts, no wonder they are always a pia to get out )


MikeR