2G Lateral arm question

[electrohead]

Hey guys,
I'm in the process of replacing my front control arms (upper and lower). I ordered the Mevotech greasable ones from Rock Auto, but during install, I ripped the boot on one of my lateral arms. So I got a replacement from Advance Auto (non greasable), but (according to some reviews) these still randomly fail the way the original non sealed factory arms used to.
Do you think running a bit of urethane seam sealer would be a good idea to keep moisture from getting in, or is there something else I can use? Seeing the reviews got me a little concerned, but I need the car on the road while replacement parts come in.

Btw, for arms without fittings, I have a small needle adapter I use to add grease between the boot and shaft. I have found that the control arms can be hit and miss with regards to being greased.

 

[pauleyman]

Hey guys,
I'm in the process of replacing my front control arms (upper and lower). I ordered the Mevotech greasable ones from Rock Auto, but during install, I ripped the boot on one of my lateral arms. So I got a replacement from Advance Auto (non greasable), but (according to some reviews) these still randomly fail the way the original non sealed factory arms used to.
Do you think running a bit of urethane seam sealer would be a good idea to keep moisture from getting in, or is there something else I can use? Seeing the reviews got me a little concerned, but I need the car on the road while replacement parts come in.

Btw, for arms without fittings, I have a small needle adapter I use to add grease between the boot and shaft. I have found that the control arms can be hit and miss with regards to being greased.

Balljoint boots typically don't just sit there or use sealer. They are held on by a snap ring or sometimes a press fit ring. They require no seal.

 

[curt-s]

If you haven't installed the arms yet and you have the old ones, do some measurements first. Mevotech isn't known for being great quality and are firmly entrenched well under Moog even for quality.
We all have to take what we can get nowadays but knowing this before you throw away the old ones could help explain camber and caster issues down the road.

 

[electrohead]

Balljoint boots typically don't just sit there or use sealer. They are held on by a snap ring or sometimes a press fit ring. They require no seal.

Sorry, I should have been a little clearer. I'm referring to the underside of the balljoint, where the bottom cap mates to the cast housing. When the 2g cars first came out (and I'm old enough to remember. Lol) they had several failures due to moisture getting in between the casting and the cap, causing corrosion, and ultimately causing the lateral arm to fail. The revised OEM ones (back when they still sold them) has some sort of white translucent spray on seal around that problem area. I'm just wondering if maybe using some urethane sealant (possibly the 3m window urethane) might be a good precautionary measure.

 

[pauleyman]

Sorry, I should have been a little clearer. I'm referring to the underside of the balljoint, where the bottom cap mates to the cast housing. When the 2g cars first came out (and I'm old enough to remember. Lol) they had several failures due to moisture getting in between the casting and the cap, causing corrosion, and ultimately causing the lateral arm to fail. The revised OEM ones (back when they still sold them) has some sort of white translucent spray on seal around that problem area. I'm just wondering if maybe using some urethane sealant (possibly the 3m window urethane) might be a good precautionary measure.

I have no idea. I don't remember that on my recall arms. I guess you could put something there if you want. I didn't think it was corrosion that was the failure. Not sure I ever knew.

 

[jed344]

Interesting i was not aware they revised them. I replaced all my arms years ago with brand new oem mitsu ones before they became made of unobtanium. A buddy did too. I may have to go look at my car now and see. Window urethane would likely work fine. I have been doing body work over 15 years now and the uses i find for it haha.

 

[electrohead]

If you haven't installed the arms yet and you have the old ones, do some measurements first. Mevotech isn't known for being great quality and are firmly entrenched well under Moog even for quality.
We all have to take what we can get nowadays but knowing this before you throw away the old ones could help explain camber and caster issues down the road.

I have had pretty good luck with the Mevotech control arms (knock on wood), minus the one that came with an already loose balljoint with up and down play. That's why I never install anything without inspecting it first. Manufacturing defects happen, and they don't always get caught at the factory. Rockauto sent a replacement one damn fast, so that was a plus. The only reason I went ahead to swap all the control arms is since one of my lower curved arms had a torn bushing and I figured I've had those arms on for about 8 years, it would be wiser to change them all out.

And I agree with you, we have to take what we can get, but I'm just looking at possibly minimizing failures down the road. That's why I'm looking into the possiblility of using some urethane sealant on historic failure points.

Also, what manufacturer would be the best quality option out there for our control arms?

 

[curt-s]

From a mass producer? Nobody. Everybody raced to the bottom in order to maximize profits by minimizing production costs, so even once well respected names like Moog are no longer a go-to for quality despite what their boxes say.
That being said, I myself have a bin full of NOS parts from them and a couple other manufacturers because it's what is left. My only hope is that the lifetime left of my ownership of the car doesn't necessitate any more replacements of what I have on the shelf. Not daily driving the car helps that.

For quality, you need to seek those with the fab skills on this site. You won't get every part and each one is a small fortune, but it's quality and they stand behind their work.

 

[electrohead]

Interesting i was not aware they revised them. I replaced all my arms years ago with brand new oem mitsu ones before they became made of unobtanium. A buddy did too. I may have to go look at my car now and see. Window urethane would likely work fine. I have been doing body work over 15 years now and the uses i find for it haha.

Their "revision" was nothing more than some thin film to seal the area. Basically, a bandaid. When I still had my '95, I remember seeing a thin translucent white-ish film on the perimeter of the bottom cap. When I asked the parts guy what that was, he told me that was there as a precaution to keep moisture out, because of the initial design's failure rate. Maybe he knew what he was talking about, maybe he didn't. But what he said stayed with me in the back of my head all these years later, so there's that.

 

[jed344]

Their "revision" was nothing more than some thin film to seal the area. Basically, a bandaid. When I still had my '95, I remember seeing a thin translucent white-ish film on the perimeter of the bottom cap. When I asked the parts guy what that was, he told me that was there as a precaution to keep moisture out, because of the initial design's failure rate. Maybe he knew what he was talking about, maybe he didn't. But what he said stayed with me in the back of my head all these years later, so there's that.

Oh well then . Yes all the bulk replacement parts now days usually are not great. There is some people who are making very high quality tubular ones now dsm's but you will pay for it. Good work is not cheap and cheap work is not good. When i last bought all the new oem arms as i recall it was over $500 for all the front arms with old NOS mitsu stuff too. The last moog stuff i used was ball joints on my diesel truck and they failed fast too. I spent a small fortune for some made by a small quality shop in canada and those have been bullet proof. To much out sourced badly made stuff now. I consider it lucky we at least have a small group of talented people remaking high quality items for these cars.

 

[curt-s]

Just need more kidneys to sell to afford it

 

[electrohead]

From a mass producer? Nobody. Everybody raced to the bottom in order to maximize profits by minimizing production costs, so even once well respected names like Moog are no longer a go-to for quality despite what their boxes say.
That being said, I myself have a bin full of NOS parts from them and a couple other manufacturers because it's what is left. My only hope is that the lifetime left of my ownership of the car doesn't necessitate any more replacements of what I have on the shelf. Not daily driving the car helps that.

For quality, you need to seek those with the fab skills on this site. You won't get every part and each one is a small fortune, but it's quality and they stand behind their work.

Yeah, not daily driving it helps. Unfortunately, I need to drive my car for a bit to allow me to address some issues on my daily without rushing anything due to needing it on the road the next day.

I have some NOS parts as well, but mostly some small exterior parts. I've begun to actually order two of whatever I may need that the dealerships can still get, just in case. Thankfully, Mitsubishi used some of the smaller parts I've needed on their newer cars.

 

[jed344]

Just need more kidneys to sell to afford it

Sadly that is the state these cars are in. I wont go all back in my day as i see your join date is similar to mine so you know.. Lucky we where hoarders over all these years. So many things now that if my local group did not have sitting collecting dust for 10 years would be almost impossible to find. We also started a while back buying multiple of anything dealers had laying around collecting dust on there shelves. Surprising amount of stuff Chrysler dealers have. We have found some stuff just by going in and asking dealerships and somehow they come back with a bag covered in dust haha. My buddy scored a complete 2gb talon set of service books the dealers where giving that was never opened a few years back. The stuff in there is pure gold.

 

[electrohead]

Oh well then . Yes all the bulk replacement parts now days usually are not great. There is some people who are making very high quality tubular ones now dsm's but you will pay for it. Good work is not cheap and cheap work is not good. When i last bought all the new oem arms as i recall it was over $500 for all the front arms with old NOS mitsu stuff too. The last moog stuff i used was ball joints on my diesel truck and they failed fast too. I spent a small fortune for some made by a small quality shop in canada and those have been bullet proof. To much out sourced badly made stuff now. I consider it lucky we at least have a small group of talented people remaking high quality items for these cars.

Yeah, with the lower quality parts in auto parts stores now, I've gotten to the point of just replacing wear items ahead of time to avoid anything failing while I'm driving "enthusiastically" on a back road. After replacing a non geasable ball joint years, years back on my '95 (and I used an OEM part) and having it fail within 6 months (started noticing an old motel bed style squeak while hitting bumps in the road), I started adding Valvoline high temp synthetic grease to every balljoint (greasable and sealed) before installation. You'll never know 100% that enough grease is added, if any at all, unless you add it yourself. Human error is a thing, after all.

 

[electrohead]

Sadly that is the state these cars are in. I wont go all back in my day as i see your join date is similar to mine so you know.. Lucky we where hoarders over all these years. So many things now that if my local group did not have sitting collecting dust for 10 years would be almost impossible to find. We also started a while back buying multiple of anything dealers had laying around collecting dust on there shelves. Surprising amount of stuff Chrysler dealers have. We have found some stuff just by going in and asking dealerships and somehow they come back with a bag covered in dust haha. My buddy scored a complete 2gb talon set of service books the dealers where giving that was never opened a few years back. The stuff in there is pure gold.

I recently scored a shifter cable set for my car that was still in the bag, complete with a yellowed Mitsu sticker. I never thought the day would come that I'd be so happy over old car parts. I'm glad that I found it before I finished my auto to manual conversion, since it was still half apart and there was a lot more room to run it.

 

[jed344]

I recently scored a shifter cable set for my car that was still in the bag, complete with a yellowed Mitsu sticker. I never thought the day would come that I'd be so happy over old car parts. I'm glad that I found it before I finished my auto to manual conversion, since it was still half apart and there was a lot more room to run it.

I know the feeling. We have a few sets of lightly used shifter cables laying around and lightly used non cruise throttle cables. These type of things we usually will bring to the shootout if we have to many and they sell very fast. We have a pile of old aftermarket parts you never see anymore. The biggest laugh we get is not the fact of buddy has a B and M shifter in his car but he has the original box and paper work mint yet. Has to be one of the last box's and paper work around haha.

 

[curt-s]

Sadly that is the state these cars are in. I wont go all back in my day as i see your join date is similar to mine so you know.. Lucky we where hoarders over all these years. So many things now that if my local group did not have sitting collecting dust for 10 years would be almost impossible to find. We also started a while back buying multiple of anything dealers had laying around collecting dust on there shelves. Surprising amount of stuff Chrysler dealers have. We have found some stuff just by going in and asking dealerships and somehow they come back with a bag covered in dust haha. My buddy scored a complete 2gb talon set of service books the dealers where giving that was never opened a few years back. The stuff in there is pure gold.

I never hoarded, and what's worse is I only got my 2g a couple years ago so I have little spares of anything for this gen.
Some suspension parts, one xfer case, and a spare head/block that's already been decked and bored out 20.
I'm boned if I have a major failure.

But that's my problem and not this thread's
(Goes back to corner)