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Rebuilding control arms

2K views 7 replies 3 participants last post by  retho78 
#1 ·
Man, what a pain in the pooper. Took me about 8 hours total just to replace the vertical bushing and the ball joint on one arm. Broke my bench vise, one heavy duty threaded rod for my home made press, and a drill bit. Didn't even do the horizontal bushing because I didn't have another day to kill. Bushing's and a ball joint for one arm cost me $75 on ebay, a new arm with bushings and a ball joint already installed, costs $125. I'll most certainly be buying a new arm for the pass side.
It totally fixed my low speed shimmy and mostly fixed my 70mph shimmy which was really bad. We'll see how it is after I change the pass arm.







 
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#4 ·
When my steering whell started to shake realy bad on speed over 40mph 2 years ago. I found alot of threads that cateras front control arm bushings can cost that, so having over 130k on my oem control arms I decided to replace both control arms with Dorman brand, I found them at Rockauto and they was the most cheap at that time too. What I mistake! !!!! When I replaced them difference was tremendously. What a nice rid. My car become like new, but not for long. After about a year, my shake came back..... I took control arms down and find that my vertical bushings are cracked. ... I call Dorman for a warranty replacement, they told me that I have send broken back for inspection and wait for new ones to arive. ... it would take like TWO weeks. Really.???... I needed my car back on track today....
So I put them back and one. And order moog vertical and ployflex horizontal from UK. When they arived I took my control arms down again and took it my local auto shop to replace bushings. I paid guy like $60 for work. New bushings cost me in total $120.... what a waste. I will never buy anything from Dorman...
 
#5 ·
I certainly hope the Moog arms will last longer than a year, as I will be buying those this week.
$60 is not bad to have a shop do it. I went to a few shops first and they wanted an hour labor which was $100. I've rebuilt the arms on my Porsche which have similiar bushings but it has 2 halves on the inner sleeve where the Catera has a single sleeve which is much harder to get in and out. No matter, I certainly won't be doing that again. (I think you meant "Powerflex" bushings, that is also what I have on my Porsche)
 
#7 ·
So much for that.
"Unfortunately MOOG Part # OPWP0568 is not currently available and has been removed from your shopping cart"

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Hmm, guess there are lots of makers for this control arm. I went with the FLENNOR FL587G (FL587-G) for $60.79. I know Flennor makes good parts for my other car.
 
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