CLOSED 5/31/20 GROUP BUY Dirt King LCA's Ball Joint Type GROUP BUY ENDS 5/31/20 CLOSED

I was talking about the Marlin Crawler HD LCA braces. It's a must do mod. No alignment problems at all and I have ran some pretty hard trails in Moab and other states. Keep hammering on that rig Brother.

 

Ok folks, i am making it work. @Unchained 5150 was notified and I am in for the glory of the dirt king.

 

Woooooooooooooooooooooo Hooooooooooooooooooooo

 

Nice.

 

And since he is maintenance guy whenever I need shit done. We get to do both at the same time

 

Right on, I want to see pics of these things on your trucks. This is one hell of a great product.

 

I'm going to grab those Marlin Crawler Braces to

 

Now is the time to do them especially since you are changing the lowers

 

That's the plan

 

Right on. You can run a bead along the cam tabs also.

 

Anyone know if these Marlin Crawler gussets will work if you already have TC cam tab gussets?

 

Yes, but with a little bit of grinding.
You either cleanup TC cam tabs or MC HD Braces or both.

 

Holy cow that would be beefy as fuck

 

Yeah, here's hoping. Post up when you get around to installing them. Ease of installation is a pretty significant concern for me.

 

I'm on the fence about buying these. Somebody help me pro/con this out. I'm not a "nonbeliever," I just like to analyze before dropping a lot of money.

PRO
Reported customer service interactions are excellent
Similar weight to OEM part
Probably stronger than OEM part; not proven, but different design makes it likely
Zerk fittings to grease failure-prone parts, increasing longevity and reliability
Should smooth out the installation process for my upcoming lift kit; no seized bushings to fight
Compatible with sway bar assembly

NEUTRAL
Huge logo plate - some like it, some don't
Matching UCAs are available - still wondering if SPC is a better option due to adjustability

CON
No warranty
Costs more than an ARB front bumper
Reinforced construction and skid plates to protect a part that probably doesn't need protection for 99% of us
Moog ball joints are proven to last longer than 1" uniballs, not OEM ball joints
Water drainage appears to be more difficult than with OEM part

 

I'd say there are way better places to spend your money for most people. If you don't know you need these, you probably don't. You've had your truck for a few months, there are not many places to exercise your truck very much east of the Mississippi, start with making sure you actually want to spend this much money on your truck. It looks like you are leaning towards an OME/Dobisons setup which is great for east coast low speed wheeling. These are designed more for the go fast, get air crowd.

 

Thanks for the feedback, @hoarder23, and good on you for looking up my previous posts. I neglected to mention how I intend to use my truck, which is a pretty important factor when evaluating a product like this.

The main thing that I find attractive about these LCAs is the integrated grease fittings. I don't know if that's something that can be retrofitted to the OEM LCAs, nor do I know if it would have the same effect as the fittings on these LCAs. What I do know is I plan on driving my truck until I retire in 26 years and grease is a helluva lot cheaper than steel, so any easy extra maintenance I can do to ensure longevity has my utmost interest.

The idea of up-armoring the lowest exposed component on the truck is appealing, too. I'm not really into offroading because I deal with enough crap on the road. An LCA that can handle whacking an errant crowbar at 70 mph has my attention.

 

You can buy 2 sets of OEM lowers and caster hardware and still have money left over for the price of these. You're nuking this. Instead of spending a bunch of money to prevent problems that may or may not happen, spend a small amount of money on proper preventive maintenance. Then spend some on what will make you happier while dealing with Hampton Roads traffic.

 

Didn't even notice your Navy emblem until you dropped the "you're nuking this" line. Do you have Tacoma PMS cards? I could use 'em.

Fair points dude. I know I'm nuking the shit out of this, but it's all in the interest of anticipating and preventing issues down the line. Combine that with my complete absence of auto tech know-how and you've got a lethal combination... for my wallet.

Also, I'm in the middle of researching suspension upgrades and it probably shows. Buy. All. The. Things.

 

I definitely didn't need them for how much hard wheeling I don't do lol and it was honestly more to match their boxed uppers I eventually planned on getting anyways... I convinced myself that a deal like this doesn't come around too often