[barrok69]

I'm surprised a poly bushing in the front mounting location would work. Poly is typically used to provide more resistance to torsion than a rubber bushing provides. In that front bushing, you want the trailing arm to pivot up and down freely, so you need the bushing to allow that, but resist forward/aft motion under braking and acceleration. A spherical bearing (or one of the spherical bushings like those offered by Ballistic Fab and others) seems like the right answer IMO.

Can you re-load the pics? I'm getting the same error referred to previously.

Edit: The hollow bolt at the knuckle to allow for greasing through the bolt is a good detail.

I'm kind of leaning the same way with the front bushing. Ideally you don't want very much resistance for the up and down rotation this joint sees. You don't want it too soft either or else you'll end up with increased wheel hop and poor wheel stability. I'd be curious to see how easy it is to deflect a 70A poly bushing with the long moment arm of this trailing arm. I'm assuming it moves fine but I'm not sure how long the bushing will last from a durability perspective since poly isn't as soft and forgiving as rubber. Typically a bushing setup of this nature isn't meant to see more than 5° of side to side deflection.

Another thing to consider when replacing a rubber bushing with a poly bushing or cross-axis ball-joint is that it will definitely transmit more road noise into the cabin. For some this is a deal breaker, for others not an issue. Anybody that has a BMR trailing arm can comment on this as it should feel the same as what Max is offering, just have less wheel clearance.

Keeping in mind if enough of us want a cross-axis ball-joint in place of the poly bushing Max said in his original post he was willing to consider it based on interest. From a construction standpoint it shouldn't be too difficult to replace that captured bushing end on a jig with a self contained balljoint to weld on. Having a press fit balljoint insert put into the "pipe end" wouldn't be advisable due to the required material thickness needed to hold the balljoint in place. You'd want at least a 3/8" surround holding it in, preferably a cast iron link to maintain the "press fit".

I think I'd fall into the prefer a balljoint category. I'd already be degrading ride quality with a poly front bushing over stock setup and stepping up to a cross-axis ball-joint should be very similar in noise transmission to the poly bushing. I'd take the cross-axis balljoint for durability purposes at that point, only problem being that if they don't last very long, you'd have to replace the entire arm, versus replacing a removable bushing unless they were somehow rebuildable (ballistic fab weld on balljoints are rebuildable).

I think If Max offered this welded on to the front end

http://www.ballisticfabrication.com/263-Heavy-Duty-Ballistic-Joint_p_1226.html
it would be the perfect trailing arm.

Keep up the good work Creative Steel. We appreciate the never ending options that you are developing for this platform!

 

[barrok69]

This is hilarious !!! "Hey, What the $%#@^% is going on here"?

"Why is Lil421A getting preferential treatment"?



He's not getting special treatment, he bought a set of the arms with the urethane bushings at the front end of the arms. We've had those available since I first posted that we were making these arms. The group buy is for arms with the spherical bearings at the front end of the arms.


UPDATE :

The arms are finished being fabbed and will go to powder coat tomorrow or the next day. I want to send a few sets of toe rods with this load for the guys that wanted them in black.

**Cough** **Cough** You should send them to the guys that wanted them red !

 

[barrok69]

Just got a call from Kristie last night. My arms should arrive in a couple days. yay!

 

[barrok69]

Yesssss !!! They look great. I'm hoping to get them installed this weekend.

 

[barrok69]

That was some fast shipping. Looks like they made it intact.

Trailing arms just went to the post office for the following:

DK, 1BadCTS, Dtrain and ItsaV.


If you are part of the group buy on these trailing arms and you are not listed on any of the three previous lists YOU need to call us. We either need final payment or your color choice or if you want the hub bushings included.

I was surprised to see them today! The box was ripped a bit from the weight of the arms but the impervious bubble wrap/plastic wrap job you guys did held up tremendously. Thanks again!