Cut and weld lower control arms

Nice tooling and setup. looks super strong.

 

I was running total chaos stock length upper and lower control arms. Caster was over 4 degrees, and I cleared my 285/75/16 MTR/K tires with no cab mount chop.
I was running over 3 degrees just with the TC UCA.

 

Just do it, worse thing is you will have to buy an aftermarket replacement. You will never know unless you try... I am sure there are plenty of stock replacements available in this forum.

 

Ditto just do it

 

With the lift you have you should be able to get 4 degrees of caster if you just get SPC ucas. Have your alignment guy max out your factory cams to get maximum caster and adjust camber at the UCA. Add caster at the UCA by rotating the ball joint until you get to your desired numbers. Readjust the lower cams if needed to even out both sides.

By doing this you should have lots of room behind the tire and away from the cab mount or fender flares.

 

No I'm saying that the material laid down from a weld is stronger than the metal it is fusing together

 

I'm pretty sure the control arms are forged and therefore could be welded fairly easily. However you would need to send them out to be stress relieved and have the heat treat re-done to factory specs. Not worth the effort when you can by aftermarket stock length arms.

Normal weld filler is at least 70,000 psi tensile strength. Much stronger than the material being welded. This creates problems though because it causes stress and can lead to cracks in the base materials.

 

if you really need clearance get SPC arms.

Take your stock LCA and adjust them so the lower control arms outer point is the furthest forward you can possibly be (Front LCA bolt slid all the way to centerline, rear slid all the way out from centerline) then use the SPC arms to get your zero to sligntly negative camber back.

FYI the LCA has way more effect on wheel placement within the wheel well than the UCA as the center of the hub is MUCH closer to the lower ball joint than the top.


But like stated unless you are like @snowsk8air2 on brand new 35's, you arent gonna need to modify the LCA.

 

There is no way Toyota is heat treating the control arms, or the frame, or the rear axle housing, or the aluminum front bumper reinforcement. They probably build a prototype, jump it 12" and if it holds up, they call it good.

 

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/check-your-spindle-gussets-for-cracks-with-b-s-talk.474632/

They talk about how the spindles are heat treated in here, or something like that.

 

Frame no, but the forged parts have to be treated to get a consistent strength. When they do the forging the metal would be so hard that it would easily crack when stressed. It has to be annealed and tempered to an appropriate hardness for the application.

 

I tool around on this site a lot and have never seen anyone do this, and to be quite honest, just to get a small bump in caster its borderline insane.

My personal recommendation would be if you are dead set on increasing caster via the LCA I would recommend calling anyone who manufacturers aftermarket LCAs and inquire if they add caster by default with their design.

Another idea......I believe when people lift and get their trucks aligned most people aren't able to max out their caster cam without introducing excessive positive camber(my personal experience), a heimed UCA will allow you to COMPLETELY max out caster on the LCA and set camber to zero via the heimed UCA. Just to warn you though, if you max out your caster cam the bushings(if using a aftermarket LCA my not be completely covered by the mounting tabs and look weird(possibly be detrimental, it doesn't look supported correctly), I currently have this problem and intend on pulling it back in an make adjustments to my heimed UCA to compensate.

You seem like you are already set in what you want to do and are just looking for validation despite everyone giving you advice to the contrary. Good luck with your endeavor.

 

As I mentioned, I do appreciate all the opinions. Obviously nobody has done it before. I'm not dead set on doing it, but at this point am considering it. As far as "the alignment guy", that's me. I do alignments on very high dollar street rods, and few restored classic muscle cars. I don't do run of the mill family vehicles or punk kid cars. I am very picky about getting the alignment perfect. It bugs the hell out of me when I see the TV shows with high dollar street rod builds (Boyd Coddington, Chip Foose, The monkey guys, etc), going down a straight road, and the steering wheel is crooked. Obviously there's much more to alignment than getting the steering wheel straight, but if they can't even get that right, how screwed up is the rest of the car? I checked out a Boyd Coddington built car, and I told the owner of it that I wouldn't work on it, and to come get it. What a screwed up mess! The engine oil pan was sitting on the crossmember! Anyway, later this week, I am going to get the Tacoma on the rack and see just what happens to the alignment when you raise it 2" or 2 1/2". Then I will decide from there which way I will go with it. As mentioned above, I'm sure the camber goes negative and limits what you can do with the caster. I know I could spend $500 on aftermarket UCAs and dial it in, but it hardly seems worth it for a 2" lift on a 99% street driven truck.

 

"but it hardly seems worth it for a 2" lift on a 99% street driven truck"

I would say the same statement about what you're planning on doing...are you going to cycle the suspension? Are you going to build a jig for the lower arm?

 

Yes, just a basic jig so the ball joint location and angle are properly relocated. Maybe I'm nuts, but it's worth considering.

 

you wanna dial in my alignment for me?
Shops around here suck with their responses like "that's not Toyota specs" (duh) or "we got it close, you won't notice" (oh I'll notice).

 

Here's what I do, keep it on the down low though. I'm subbed for cut LCAs

 

I'd be VERY interested to see your report on messing with your alignment on the Tacoma. You're going to end up with positive camber that you can't dial down though, not negative(unless you reduce caster to nothing).

I've got the SPC upper arms so I've tweeked the hell out of my alignment to be exactly where I want it, although I'm sure the toe isn't as perfect as a machine can get it.

 

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/fitting-35’s-with-minimal-trimming.626274/page-40

Thread revival. This seemed relevant, in case anyone is still interested two years later.

 

Just don't change the permanent structure of the metal and it's fine to weld on anything. Haha. Yea.

Seriously, anything can have a proper procedure made for the material/thickness/rate/current. It's what a weld engineer does. Guys who do it by feel are like people who can play the piano by ear instead of by sheets. Kinda...almost....

Anyway. As long as the welder is competent, I'd trust it fully. If you've driven within 5 miles of a refinery, you're trusting your life to a weld.

I say 5 miles because we were just told to evacuate 4 miles around a plant for Thanksgiving. Yea, that's us. Maybe welding isn't a good idea after all.