DrD123 Posted September 11, 2022 Share Posted September 11, 2022 (edited) So driving to visit my kiddo at college and the car would shake accelerating (but only once you got over 70mph or so) and on sweeping right turns at highway speeds - also when changing lanes to the right at highway speeds I'd get a little vibration/shaking... checking over everything all of the axles looked fine - no torn boots, etc. - went to the front left (drivers side) wheel and got significant motion when rocking it back and forth - figured oh joy, fried bearing - but when it moved, you could see everything connected to the hub/knuckle move which was weird - poked around some more and noticed the front bushing on the control arm (the small one - not the big rear one) had significant motion (as in, all of the motion of the wheel was from that) - few mm, anyway! Ordered up some new control arms (figured if one side was bad, other would likely follow) - car has 81k miles on it, so nothing crazy, but on the off chance one or both of the ball joints are bad, and the rear, while not moving, definitely have cracks in them, so they are probably not long for this world, so might as well replace the whole shooting match. So I have two new control arms ordered up from Subaru - hopefully this solves the problem (plus it gives me a chance to use my spiffy Astro pneumatic subaru ball joint puller, which is good!) - as a southern car, there's like zero rust, so probably not that hard to get them out without the tool, but since I have it, I'm definitely going to use it! Didn't see anything about a better aftermarket alternative than OEM, so that's what I have en route. Edited September 11, 2022 by DrD123 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FLlegacy Posted September 11, 2022 Share Posted September 11, 2022 https://www.rockauto.com/en/catalog/subaru,2010,legacy,2.5l+h4+turbocharged,1445356,suspension,control+arm,10401 The mevotech arms are highly recommended and come with all the hardware ready to install. And the rear pancake bushing is solid vs the holy stock one. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dgoodhue Posted September 12, 2022 Share Posted September 12, 2022 With a rust free car, this should be an easy job to do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrD123 Posted September 13, 2022 Author Share Posted September 13, 2022 On 9/11/2022 at 2:18 PM, FLlegacy said: The mevotech arms are highly recommended and come with all the hardware ready to install. And the rear pancake bushing is solid vs the holy stock one. I have had poor experiences in the past with Mevotech lower control arms - now that was on a Honda odyssey using their "supreme" line bought from Rockauto - first set had the boots split in pretty short order (month or so) - replaced without complaint by rockauto - then in about a year and a half the ball joints on both sides were wrecked with tons of play - replaced again without complaint, but didn't give me a positive impression with respect to quality control. Granted, different vehicle, and the parts get high marks (well, the little heart) on rockauto, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it, and didn't know about the other brands - OEM is $118 a side from Heuberger and they'll be here on Wednesday, so I decided to do that (they come with a new castle nut and cotter pin Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scubaboo Posted September 13, 2022 Share Posted September 13, 2022 Do the OE arms come with ball joints? Personally I'd add them so I'd have completely overhauled lower arms. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dgoodhue Posted September 13, 2022 Share Posted September 13, 2022 The OEM front LCA come with new ball joints. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FLlegacy Posted September 13, 2022 Share Posted September 13, 2022 The oem arms also come with the same rear bushing that fails early and often. I agree about mevotech quality the parts pictures look subpar, but they seem to last according to other members. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
silverton Posted September 13, 2022 Share Posted September 13, 2022 we use import direct control arms, and they generally come with balljoints. Actually did a set on a h6 legacy recently, they were aluminum with solid rear bushings, kinda crazy! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
motorbreath Posted September 14, 2022 Share Posted September 14, 2022 On 9/11/2022 at 4:18 PM, FLlegacy said: https://www.rockauto.com/en/catalog/subaru,2010,legacy,2.5l+h4+turbocharged,1445356,suspension,control+arm,10401 The mevotech arms are highly recommended and come with all the hardware ready to install. And the rear pancake bushing is solid vs the holy stock one. I had these installed when I had the failed front subframe replaced, so far so good, very happy with how they are holding up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FLlegacy Posted September 14, 2022 Share Posted September 14, 2022 15 hours ago, silverton said: we use import direct control arms, and they generally come with balljoints. Actually did a set on a h6 legacy recently, they were aluminum with solid rear bushings, kinda crazy! The older models it was a little more of a direct swap, the usdm 5th gen is wider than the JDM models so the arms from import aren't a direct bolt-on without other mods. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
creep_nu Posted September 16, 2022 Share Posted September 16, 2022 been running mevotechs for a year and a half now, and all is good. if you're worried about the ball joints you can always replace them with OE ones before install since they're relatively cheap anyways, but the uprated bushings, in my mind, make the mevos worth it over going OE Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrD123 Posted September 16, 2022 Author Share Posted September 16, 2022 Installed the control arms - didn't get to use my cool Astro Pneumatic tool, though - one of the benefits of living in the southwest - I was able to just pull the ball joints out of the control arms without removing them from the control arm first. Front bushing on the drivers side was destroyed, and the rear bushings had some partial tears in them. Sorry if I offended the Mevotech fans - their supreme line was 0 and 2 for the lower control arms on our old minivan (05 Odyssey - even got fancy and upgraded to the aluminum ones from the 08...), so confidence lost, so to speak. Maybe next time I have to do control arms I'll try them or another aftermarket version - the OEMs lasted since I bought the car new 11 years and 80k miles ago though, so it will probably be a while! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
motorbreath Posted September 16, 2022 Share Posted September 16, 2022 29 minutes ago, DrD123 said: I was able to just pull the ball joints out of the control arms without removing them from the control arm first. You have got to be kidding me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
silverton Posted September 16, 2022 Share Posted September 16, 2022 I replace half a dozen ball joints a week. Rarely do I have trouble with them. But I am in the PacNW so it helps. I'm with you DrD, I have had mevotech stuff and am not impressed with it at all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
motorbreath Posted September 17, 2022 Share Posted September 17, 2022 2 hours ago, silverton said: I'm with you DrD, I have had mevotech stuff and am not impressed with it at all. Just for future reference, you suggest OEM or is there another aftermarket that is better? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
silverton Posted September 17, 2022 Share Posted September 17, 2022 acdelco or delphi if you can't swing for oem. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrD123 Posted September 17, 2022 Author Share Posted September 17, 2022 (edited) 10 hours ago, motorbreath said: You have got to be kidding me. I thought it was pretty funny - most of the videos I have seen show it being rough to remove them from the knuckle without the astro tool, so I bought that a while back. When doing them this time, I just used a wood block and a hammer to smack down on the control arm once I had the pinch bolt off. Took a few good hits, but they both popped out. They were rusty mostly up towards the end/bottom, but the part closer to the boot was actually pretty clean... We get snow very infrequently here, and I am pretty good about getting an undercarriage wash shortly after we do. Very little road salt to deal with. (growing up in the northeast, I am used to everything rotting out, but it definitely doesn't do that here) - I put antiseize on them just in case when installing (as well as inside the knuckle) then just used the floor jack and a block of wood to pop them into the knuckle and they went right in. I am curious how folks torque the front bushing down while the car is on the ground - I ended up just lifting from under the control arm with a floor jack/block of wood until the center of the hub was as close to ride height as I could get it with the wheel off (maybe a cm or so away from actual ride height- I was lifting the car up off the jack stands at that point... figured it was good enough and torqued it down.) Edited September 17, 2022 by DrD123 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
silverton Posted September 17, 2022 Share Posted September 17, 2022 I use the alignment rack to torque those bolts. You did as well as you could at home! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dgoodhue Posted September 17, 2022 Share Posted September 17, 2022 I did it the same way with the jack under the control arm. I had the same experience of having no problem with getting the ball joints out on my 2012 which I drove only one winter. My 2009 OB that I did was complete different, the pinch bolt broken on one and it took a lot of effect to get the other ball joint out f the spindle. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Plastixx Posted October 6, 2022 Share Posted October 6, 2022 (edited) On 9/16/2022 at 12:11 PM, creep_nu said: been running mevotechs for a year and a half now, and all is good. if you're worried about the ball joints you can always replace them with OE ones before install since they're relatively cheap anyways, but the uprated bushings, in my mind, make the mevos worth it over going OE On 9/11/2022 at 4:18 PM, FLlegacy said: https://www.rockauto.com/en/catalog/subaru,2010,legacy,2.5l+h4+turbocharged,1445356,suspension,control+arm,10401 The mevotech arms are highly recommended and come with all the hardware ready to install. And the rear pancake bushing is solid vs the holy stock one. I received a set of Mevotech front control arms from RockAuto yesterday. They DO NOT have the solid rubber bushings, just standard type that eventually rip. Pretty pissed about it honestly. I could have saved $60 by going with the Ultra-Power arms if I knew that. They're both made in China and I have Sankei 555 balls joints I'm going to use anyway. Edited October 6, 2022 by Plastixx 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
motorbreath Posted October 6, 2022 Share Posted October 6, 2022 11 hours ago, Plastixx said: I received a set of Mevotech front control arms from RockAuto yesterday. They DO NOT have the solid rubber bushings, just standard type that eventually rip. Pretty pissed about it honestly. That stinks, I bought these about 1.5 years ago and they came with the solid bushings. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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