Anyone have experience with either of these control arms on Slee's website? Looking for an alternative to Mr. Ts as they're so expensive. Are the bushings as good?
Rear Control Arms sold by Slee
- Thread starter Rolocado
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Look at adjustables if you're planning to replace. More versatile if you ever need to adjust pinion angles. There are a couple of adjustable options out there from different vendors, but my preferred are offered by TrailTailor(@reevesci) DOM tube (very strong), supplied johnny joints for increased articulation, and he makes them house. The poly bushes supplied are very good.
I have slee front and rear bumpers and he makes really nice stuff, but I too recommend adjustable if your going to replace them. I had some blown bushings and replaced my rear upper / lower with Metal tech this past summer. They are great quality and I was able to get them for a holiday sale price of $500?. Think I saved over $120. I have also bought a few trail tailor items and he makes very nice stuff! Cant go wrong with anything he sells. Considering the sale discount, it was easy to go with metal tech.
- Thread starter
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What would I ever need to play with the angle for? I wheel it but have never though of needing to adjust anything and I'm never going to lift it
I bought the Slee adjustable, I love them, big strong and so far I have not needed to adjust them.
Somebodyelse5
16124-75030
I have these and they have been great. I have the adjustable uppers from metal tech, but only because they were on sale and were cheaper than the ones from slee. I set them to be the same length as the factory arms. That said, if you get adjustable, you need to stay on top of checking that the jam nut doesn't come loose (it happens)... I don't think adjustable arms are necessary for anyone going with the typical 2-3" lift (and that is really about as crazy as you can get with our rigs)... I haven't read much about people having issues with drive line angles (or anything else that could be corrected with adjustable links).
As someone much smarter than me once said... "With great adjustability comes great responsibility"
As someone much smarter than me once said... "With great adjustability comes great responsibility"
trdcorolla
SILVER Star
Thanks for asking this. I'm staying stock noticed my upper and lower arm bushings have cracks in them but aren't making any noise yet. Will these Slee's fit in the Trail Tailor skids?
Yup min are always loose. Every time I check them. With or without lock tight.
Good point about the jam nuts- they need to be tight- and checked every so often.
As for the necessity of adjustbles- the difference in price between a standard replacement link to an adjustable is marginal and the benefits of adj outweigh the latter imo.
If you took before lift & after lift measurements of your operating angles youd be surprised with the variation on just a 2” lift. Some rear springs like (ironman toy13b), cross over from the 80 application and on a 100 gives closer to 3” on an unarmored rig. Thats more than enough to move the pinion angle a couple of degrees- affecting the smooth operation of your ujoints.
On fresh ujoints maybe you wouldnt notice for a while, on old ujoints you can expect acceleration/ deceleration/ constant driveline vibes in short order.
We dont see too much discussion about pinion angles here, because its often overlooked as an initial solution to curing high speed driveline vibes. Its also a fiddly complicated process to measure and adjust, re-adjust(an expensive process if you have to pay someone to do it). Lots of people post lift complain of driveline vibes but dont often understand what the cause is or where to begin to look or how to cure. Ive found that 100 series operating angles especially on aged rigs are sensitive to operating angle alignment. Making a 0.5 degree adjustment can make an improvement at highway speeds.
Not necessary, but useful on lifted 100s to tune out driveline vibes.
i had purchased and returned a set of SPC rear lowers. they are the same size as the OEM and advertised at 2X strong for what its worth. ill be going with a set of Trail tailors or Metal Techs. The SPC rear lowers are about 210$ shipped on Ebay or thats what i paid they have a lot of the SPC parts. with my prior experience i am not a fan of SPC and i think their UCA are a little glorified IMHO... spend the extra money on a nice pair of the ones i mentioned
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Somebodyelse5
16124-75030
I would say that only one set of adjustable arms would be in order for correcting u-joint angle. Two sets just adds way too many variables for only correcting a small driveline issue.
That said, my old youjoint do not vib
YardPig
SILVER Star
Have you run the SPC upper control arms? Why are they glorified?
this is just my Personal opinion. ive run the same SPC Upper control arms in my 1st gen tundra for two years, and was not overly impressed. had a lot of rubbing issues partially my fault with large tires but overall not blown away. i picked up a pair for my 100 series on ebay brand new for $400 and am contemplating returning them as i do not want to open up more possible fitting issues like with my tundra , just from my first hand experience. id rather save the money and go a different route away from SPC for UCA from a quality standpoint. this is just my option im no expert and sure some people will chime in with their excellent experiences with them so take my opinion with a grain of salt
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YardPig
SILVER Star
Thanks. I guess your rubbing issues were due to not dialing in enough positive caster and the tire hitting the back of the fender?
I find the SPC UCA gives tons of adjustment on a 100. In fact I don't know of another manufacturer of UCA that allows the adjustment, especially the caster that the SPC offers, so my opinion is they are in a league of their own. SPC has been doing only suspension for a very very long time (no I don't work for them). They had some issues with their first batch of non-greaseable ball joints, they warrantied these for the new greaseable style and I have had no other issues.
Sorry I'm getting off topic here, just wanted to clarify your concerns with their products.
I find the SPC UCA gives tons of adjustment on a 100. In fact I don't know of another manufacturer of UCA that allows the adjustment, especially the caster that the SPC offers, so my opinion is they are in a league of their own. SPC has been doing only suspension for a very very long time (no I don't work for them). They had some issues with their first batch of non-greaseable ball joints, they warrantied these for the new greaseable style and I have had no other issues.
Sorry I'm getting off topic here, just wanted to clarify your concerns with their products.
maybe i should look into that with my toyota. it was mainly front fender rubbing, it saw two wheel alignment "specialists " and they just said there was nothing they could do. i plan on just taking a dremel to the fender one of these days, ill look into it more thanks for the info on the ball joints. maybe ill give them a shot in my 100 just after the issues with my tundra i was honestly just not going to bother. have you used their rear lower control arms for the 100?
YardPig
SILVER Star
Few specialists even bother with clocking the balljoint for caster because after you need to start from square one with alignment. Lazy. More positive caster is going to pull the front wheel away from the rear fender contact point, more negative will draw it closer. More positive caster also takes away the white knuckle ride characteristic of a lifted 100, much less twitchy, better steering feel and return to center.
http://www.spcalignment.com/instructions/25455-INS_WEB.pdf
No, I run factory rear control arms...for now...adjustable at some point, probably fab my own to keep costs down.
http://www.spcalignment.com/instructions/25455-INS_WEB.pdf
No, I run factory rear control arms...for now...adjustable at some point, probably fab my own to keep costs down.
