Lower control arms - regular replacement needed?

[Nick Mann]

On Mitsy items you often get a groaning noise with steering at low speed. I'm not sure if that is true of the aftermarket stuff. The only way I have found to *try* and gauge the condition of the ball joint on that arm is to remove the ball joint from the hub carrier and then feel the looseness of the ball in it's socket. Even then telling anyone how long it will last is a mugs game - but it should give an indication of excellent, horrendous or something inbetween.

The cause/effect of the engine mounts must be a minimal one, at best I would have thought? The engine will be strapped better to the chassis, which should reduce the extra shock through the chassis of the engine moving on it's mounts under extreme conditions.

[orionn2o]

Mine went over a pothole the second time, the first time was round a corner. I imagine it probably doesn't matter tho. Its a horrible feeling as you grind to a halt with half the road scraping underneath your car!

[VR457]

Perhaps the reason is no other than high mileage so these should be replaced at least every 100k miles. Lucky the wheel took the force rather than the underside.

Still waiting for photo for no other reason than being really ill today and not able to crawl out.

[VR457]

What do you think?


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[adaxo]

My car seemed to have the recall done and its just pased 100k miles so perhaps it should be a service item def at this mileage.

I need to ask, is the car definitely had arms changed via recall or just checked?? or just dust cover replaced??.

[VR457]

I have sent a check of to Mitsy UK. I did have it checked on one the threads a year and a bit ago and it said all the recalls had been carried out.

[VR457]

Well, as it turned out, the arm that failed was most likely not OE. I had checked the recall status with Mitsy UK and they confirmed that all the work had been carried out, from 2002 - 2003. The car was imported into the UK in 2007, i got my hands on it 2009. So where did it go wrong????

Here are some pics for you to 'spot the difference', first with an original arm and second with the arm taken from the nearside which was fine.

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Another thank you to Mr Mann for taking the time out to come up and work in freezing conditions.

[Nick Mann]

As Jamil said, the failed item had several differences when compared to the known mitsy item. The dust cover over the ball joint has 8 indentations in the groove on the top face on the mitsy arm, but only 6 on the failed arm. On the beam of the arm is a raised point that had been much more machined on the failed arm. The width of the beam is bigger on the failed arm at the subframe mounting end.

The failure looks to a semi trained eye like a fatigue crack (the dark area on the fracture surface) probably allowed to initiate due to corrosion following water ingress to the joint. The shiny bit on the fracture surface is the bit that has failed recently. I seem to remember PSB putting a grease nipple on his arms a few years ago so he could regularly grease the joint. In my humble opinion that is something that could save this from happening - regular grease insertion from the bottom should expel water up and away from the joint and prevent the initial corrosion. I obviously don't know if this is the way aftermarket arms fail everytime, so it is difficult to say anything with absolute certainty!

[horndog]

Just a question on replacing the lower arms, - whilst doing the job is there anything else thats makes sense to replace at the same time?

[Nick Mann]

Not really. Have a good check of the CV boots and steering rack/tie rod boots - they are easier to do with stuff out of the way. Check for any other ball joints down there with play in them. Nothing down there is a "change every x miles" it's just a case of replacing torn/worn stuff.

[Humpty's Revenge]

Just a question on replacing the lower arms, - whilst doing the job is there anything else thats makes sense to replace at the same time?

Anti roll bar bushes, drop links possibly?

[Nick Mann]

Possibly, Steve, but not necessarily. And you don't need the bottom arm off to do those jobs... there are lots of things you could change, but it all comes down to the condition of the stuff under there as to what makes sense to change, and that would be potentially different on every car.

[Humpty's Revenge]

Possibly, Steve, but not necessarily. And you don't need the bottom arm off to do those jobs... there are lots of things you could change, but it all comes down to the condition of the stuff under there as to what makes sense to change, and that would be potentially different on every car.

That be true Nick!

I did all mine when I changed my lateral arms as it was there simply because everything was off.

[wintertidenz]

Nick - with the good and failed arms, is there a way to pull out the joint from the bottom and check the actual inside of the arm of where it sits?

Just wondering if it is possible to replace the joint itself with a much higher quality part.

[Nick Mann]

Not that I am aware of. It's something I guess a few of us would buy if there was such a thing, but I think the investment to produce something of better quality than the Mitsy item would be prohibitive. On some cars (The GTO is one, I think?) you can change just the ball joint in that arm, but I haven't seen that option for the Galant. It might be possible to check the amount of rust forming at the top of the ball joint by seperating the joint and moving the rubber boot enough to see in? Obviously, the more rust the more chance of a crack initiating.

[VR457]

Think that with the amount of money spent on suspension upgrade, cambelt changes and so on, changing the arms is quite cheap, certainly compared to the damage caused by it's failure. Checking to see if the arm is OE or non standard should be Number 1 in everyones book.

Don't rely on the cars recall status alone, get down and check. As posted, sometime after recall (or during recall?) a non-standard arm found it's way in there.