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Justin Hodges (280ZForce) LCA's


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I'd like to announce that I have received my LCA's I ordered with the others during the group buy.

 

They came in a couple days ago, but I was hesitant to post any thing, due to fear of a post war. This is just meant to let everyone know, Justin did come through for me on this purchase.

 

I'd also like to add that I'm not proud at all about how I handled myself during this nightmare. I said things I'd never say to my worst enemy. I apologize!!

 

I want to believe Justin is a good guy, that just had a bad run of luck, and it will soon be forgotten.

I know that even though I feel I was treated like crap, as a customer, Justin did try at least to make me happy when possible. I was not happy with the finished product when I received my 1st pair of wide f/g flares, so to try and please me, Justin sent me a complete f/r set of wide CF flares at no charge. This tells me that Justin's not bad at heart.

 

Anyways, like I said, I just wanted to get this out there that He is filling his orders, and you'll get yours I'm confident....

 

This is not a post to bash Justin. Please keep any personal attacks out of this thread....

 

Any constructive comments welcome... :mrgreen:

 

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Edited by J. Soileau RB26zcar
changed the comments wording
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Where the tabs for the toe link are welded to the tubing, it looks like there's a piece of round stock there. Is that correct, and what's it for?

I hate to say it, but I've done stuff like that welding bodywork. I had a big gap so I put a nail in there and welded it in. It looks like that round piece is filling a gap. Not good on a suspension part IMO.

 

Nice idea, poor implementation is the best thing I can say about what I'm seeing.

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Well, I'm hoping to get experinced feedback on what I received here. I don't know enough about this stuff to know the difference from good part vs junk part.

 

Here are some more pics to help in showing if I have a part that will kill me, or one that can be made with a little work, to be safe. Its not like I can return them.... :)

 

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Personally, I would have the toe-link machined out of steel and welded on, rather then two tabs, the welds look like a beginner welder, being conservative. Thats just my opinion though, I personally wouldn't run that without re-welding it.

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Is that a piece of wire stuck in the last pic? Seems to me they didn't care too much about the final product. I'm not an expert by any means, but those welds look terrible, and I would not put that piece on the car.

 

I'm a little surprised Justin sent that out to you since he said he would only send the pieces out if they met his standards when he was selling the flares. I'm hoping he just wanted to show you he was trying to get them out...

 

Do you know who designed these? I thought it was Monzter or Myron, but can't remember which. I'm guessing Myron since I have Monzter's suspension as my desktop background and his LCAs don't look like that.

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Myron's was the original. The clevis can be "fixed" by adding a strap of metal to the back side to connect the two tabs and make it one piece. The idea of machining a clevis is way overkill IMO. Most pre-made clevises are one piece of metal folded up to make the clevis.

 

You can see the strap I welded to my strut tower bar clevis here. I did this on both sides, obviously you can't do that on the control arm piece because it would interfere with the link:

DSCN1597.jpg

 

The major issues I see are the weld quality and it looks like that clevis wasn't the right size so they just added the round pieces to fill the gaps. I would think that the welds could be ground down/off and redone and the clevis could cut off and replaced and you'd have a usable product.

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The overall layout of the tubing is similar to other tubular a-arms I've seen made by professional chassis works in Europe.

 

Execution of the welding looks less than desirable, but at this point, anything is better than nothing.

 

But general layout looks no different than pro stuff done by certified engineers.

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I had forgotten all about these. I would not run them. Those welds are horrible, and I would not consider myself to be a competent welder. There was not even an attempt to clean the slag from the surrounding metal. That right there, imo, shows how little they cared about what they were doing.

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The major issues I see are the weld quality and it looks like that clevis wasn't the right size so they just added the round pieces to fill the gaps. I would think that the welds could be ground down/off and redone and the clevis could cut off and replaced and you'd have a usable product.

 

In looking at the detailed pics I'm not sure it was crossing a gap. I really think this was an attempt to strengthen the piece. In addition to closing the back of the tab I'd add gussets from where the clevice connects to the base of the triangle. That should stiffen up the area and reduce any bending of this section of tube.

 

The rod ends used for his are very low quality. I can tell you from personal experience (having built a few sets of these myself) that these will quickly wear out if they are not quality three piece rod ends (no slot gaps either). I'm also not sure of the bolt is the correct length to have only the shank loaded. I would make sure of that too.

 

Cary

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Just to let people know:

 

Ive been running these on the street for about 3 months. I do drive it hard though. So far so good. I check them often cause I was pretty nerved about the bearing angle issue. But there are no sign of any damage and I was reassured by Justin the bearing are correct and were check by a professional in the field.

 

However, the ls1 car will see its first track event with these arms friday night. Ive check the arms again for any signs of stress after seeing this thread. Everything looks well. I Hope all goes well. Ill let you guys know how it goes.

 

I can post pics of my set if it will help.

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  • Administrators

Posts deleted.

 

This is not a discussion about Justin. It's a discussion about LCA's. Keep it technically focused and constructive or it goes to jail.

Edited by RTz
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Wow I'm surprised. I thought they were going to turn out a much better product than mine since they were being made by professional fabricators.

 

The main issue clearly is the weld quality. It looks like they were MIG possibly even arc welded. However, if you look at the adjustable toe link the bungs are TIG welded. I'm guessing different people started and finished the job. Ive done quite a bit of strength testing on different welded joints and typically welds that didn't look good didn't hold so well. Just by the looks of the welds I wouldn't be very confident on running them on my car.

 

Another issue I see is the size of the rod ends. I'm sure they'll probably work but, the outer socket part of the rod end has little surface area on the spherical ball.

 

Also, like most have mentioned already the strip missing from the clevis. That can easily be fixed with a strip like Jon mentioned.

 

I think adding more gussets would be the least of my worries with these arms and unnecessary if built properly.

 

Again here's a pic of mine for comparison.

 

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In looking at the detailed pics I'm not sure it was crossing a gap. I really think this was an attempt to strengthen the piece. In addition to closing the back of the tab I'd add gussets from where the clevice connects to the base of the triangle. That should stiffen up the area and reduce any bending of this section of tube.

There certainly are a lot of hairs in the middle of the clevis if there was no gap there, and if you were to cut the round piece off and leave the rest, the weld area looks very wide. The odd thing is that I don't think the position of the clevis is that critical, but I believe they were working off of Myron's jig and I'm guessing that's why they felt a need to keep the dimensions and fill the gap between the clevis that was cut too short and the rest of the arm, rather than just weld the clevis against the tube directly.

 

That's my SWAG anyway.

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There certainly are a lot of hairs in the middle of the clevis if there was no gap there, and if you were to cut the round piece off and leave the rest, the weld area looks very wide. The odd thing is that I don't think the position of the clevis is that critical, but I believe they were working off of Myron's jig and I'm guessing that's why they felt a need to keep the dimensions and fill the gap between the clevis that was cut too short and the rest of the arm, rather than just weld the clevis against the tube directly.

 

That's my SWAG anyway.

 

This shot of it shows what your referring to, correct?

 

conquest0069733142.jpg

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