Bad LCA bushing

Got the truck pretty much dialed in for hitting trails this summer except for what I believe is a bad LCA bushing. The thing drives perfectly except for rare hard right turns in which case the front end pops. I don't have a press to put new ones in at the moment, so my question is will this have catastrophic results on the trail?

 

What led you to believe it's the LCA bushing?

 

Sure you don’t rub something with the wheel cranked and or hitting bumps?

 

Tie rod ends and inner tie rod done on that side, just replaced CVs, ball joints are fine. The noise presented itself after installing longer struts so I’m assuming the LCA is moving differently and/or seized.

 

No, it will not have any catastrophic results. If your LCA is really out of whack, you'll have a tough/impossible time holding an alignment though, and you could go through expensive tires quickly.

The other thing - if you still have it - might be your sway bar/links causing issues. Or your steering rack?

Have you considered picking up a "temporary" aftermarket LCA? That's the route I'd go - they aren't expensive.

• Moog L: Left | R: Right
• Mevotech L: Left | R: Right

Alternatively, you can switch to poly bushings, though you'll still need a press to get the old rubber sleeved bushings out first. There are several options if you go that route:

• Strongflex Polyurethane LCA bushings. These are made of a higher performing polyurethane rather than rubber, but the real reason to go this route is because the poly bushings insert directly into the LCAs, with no pressing in of a metal sleeve. This should - in theory anyway - make future replacement a piece of cake.

Anyway, all of this is covered in this write-up on the bushing replacement job -- Step-by-Step Lower Control Arm Bushing Replacement

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I'm in more or less the same boat as the OP, and I just read your writeup and had a few points:

-It sounds like buying the Moog/Mevotech arms and polyurethane bushings separately are not much cheaper than just getting the OEM LCAs. I'm thinking I'd rather just take my chances with the Moog arms as they come, especially since it says you need a 20-ton press (I'm not sure if you can rent those anywhere?), or just bite the bullet and order the OEM aems.

-Seems like a no-brainer to replace my leaky rack at the same time since it'd save on labor and I'm tired of it leaving drops everywhere. there's just no way I'm putting the old one back on. Maybe I could send it off to be rebuilt?

-Wow, the alignment hardware is pricey; almost 200 bucks alone, which is far from negligible. Do you really need to order those as well before knowing if they need to be cut?

 

I would never recommend buying aftermarket LCAs just to install poly bushings in them. If I were to do it again, I'd buy the aftermarket LCAs (whichever were cheaper at the time on Amazon) and just install those and be done. Personally, I like the ride of a rubber bushing better anyway, now that I've experienced the poly route. Fewer squeaks, less maintenance as well.

Definitely replace the rack at the same time if it needs replacing. A new OEM rack is pricey - in the $550 range - but there are *countelss* problems with rebuilt non-OEM racks on our trucks, so unless you want to replace the rack again in a year or two, just fork over the bucks and be done with it.

The alignment hardware is extremely expensive. That said, almost every truck I've seen (unless the hardware was recently replaced) has needed new hardware. My truck has lived in CA and WA it's entire life, and I only really started driving it in 2016 (for those first 16 years, it was garaged and had a total of 30K miles on it). Still, I could only get one (of four) out without cutting.

If you don't mind being "down" while you wait for new hardware to arrive, you can hold off on purchasing it until you know you need it. But, the likelihood is that if you don't know you don't need it, then you do. Unfortunately.

Hope that helps!

 

Yea I took my truck to 4WP to install extended CVs last week and they couldn't align it due to the cam bolts being seized. (I've had it aligned a few times in the past few years so they've been touched recently-ish) I'm going to have to have someone cut them out and press new bushings, which I can't afford for a few months. In the meantime I was just curious if anyone's had experience with a bad bushing giving out/cam bolt shearing, etc. while climbing over obstacles or even driving down the road.

 

I think the main issue is that it won't hold an alignment well and might wear out your tires unevenly like Dan said. I think you should be ok to get back and forth to work for the time being though without fear of a catastrophe.

I was also able to get mine aligned about a year ago, so I might take my chances with the hardware.

 

I'm hoping the same. I recently moved from Vermont to Colorado so maybe they don't know our crusty bolt freeing techniques of the east. I might try to free 'em myself and then bring it in for an alignment, bushngs, etc.

 

Maybe spray some penetrating fluid on them.

 

Just to clarify one thing for people on this topic: you can, (and in my opinion it's easier) do this job without a press at all.

For Removing the LCA bushings:
1) Put LCA in a vice with the eyelets oriented vertically
2) Position bottle Jack between eyelets (pushing down)
3) Place bucket with rags on ground under LCA
4) Crank on bottle Jack until tension builds
5) Gently apply heat to outside surface of LCA eyelet
6) Bushing should begin to come out, now apply more force by cranking bottle jack further, until bushing is out
7) Invert LCA and repeat for other side's bushing.

New Bushing Installation:
1) Clean bushing eyelet with wire wheel on a drill or brillow pad.
2) Grease bushing and bushing eyelet.
3) Using jig (pictured below) and two box end wrenches, tighten opposing nuts to drive bushing into LCA eyelet

Jig is made of washers, 1/2" threaded rod, and two sockets. One socket is 1-3/8", and I believe the other is 1-15/16", but don't quote me on that second one.

Will update size on second one when I get home today and look.

 

OP,
Just to put a little hope into this thread about the serviceability of used OEM alignment hardware, the original hardware on my '97 V6 Taco is still GTG. Just cleaned it all up on a wire wheel and sprayed it with Cold Galvanize (below). This Taco has seen 150-200 days a year in deep mud/high water since it was new. Fortunately, this Taco has never seen any salt spray which is our Taco's worst enemy this side of a major collision. Both rear cams were frozen up with our notorious sandy MS mud when this hardware was removed, but WD-40/PB Blaster/a little heat persuaded it all apart. Good luck!

 

Glad to hear! I'm going to start spraying them in pb blaster everyday for the next few weeks and maybe after a while they'll just slide right off. Unfortunately I've been in a very personal battle with northeast salt the past few years.

 

I was unable to remove my bushings with a bottle jack on my truck from CO. no amount of PB blaster, heat, and beating under tension worked. ended up buying new Moog LCAs. also going with octagons that delete the alignment cams for better resilience going forward.

to answer the earlier question, no, having seized alignment cams does not pose a failure/safety issue.

 

Send the link for those octagon cams?

 

there are probably a dozen companies making them right now but I went with these https://kpoffroad.com/product/best-alignment-cam-upgrade-kit-cam-eliminator

 

OP since you’re in Vermont you probably wont be able to press anything out. I’m in PA and did bushings on my 3rd gen 4Runner by burning out the rubber and using a chisel to bend and remove the inner sleeve before replacing with white line poly because they include a steel sleeve while energy suspension at least at the time required the factory sleeve to remain in place.

in my situation a press would have destroyed the control arm before the bushing even moved, the burn and chisel method is pretty easy

 

you on or off the cheeseburgers though?

 

no such thing as off the cheeseburgers