LCA Lube...?

Anyone know anything about lubing the Lower control arms?

How to do it? Grease to use...?

I think I might need to disassemble them, clean them out, lube em, and re assemble so any help on that and maybe torque specs would be much appreciated.

I searched for a bit and could not find the info I was looking for.

 

anybody...?

 

Why? There are no moving parts at the inner pivots and unless the ball-joint boot is torn it's sealed for life..............

 

I've been having a click sound coming from the front and thought it might be the LCA. I know its not the UCA, or coilover/strut. So I thought I'd try there next as it tends to happen as the suspension compresses.

I guess its either the LCA or something else in the front assembly.

 

click like in cv joint gone bad? or click like in something isn't tightened down properly and moves sometimes? Are the clicks evenly spaced apart, or just one once in a while? Only when turning, all the time, only on bumps?


If its a click thats based on how fast your wheels are turning, I'm going to say to check out your axles. If its on bumps only, check the sway bar bolts on both sides, along with your upper and lower ball joint bolts and even the bolts on your shocks. If its something that only happens when your foot is on the brake, check your calipers and brakes. If its a single click when turning, check everything above plus the steering rack and tie rods.

That should give you a place to start anyway.

 

Sorry for the delayed response I've been trying to figure this sound out. To answer your questions:

click like in cv joint gone bad? not sure what that would sounds like but from what I can tell they look fine. Also it sounds like the click is not near the wheel or suspension and more up in the engine/radiator area, im thinking it might be a bad bushing up there....

click like in something isn't tightened down properly and moves sometimes? No
Are the clicks evenly spaced apart, or just one once in a while? they are random and all the time. If i get in the car I usually here a couple, turning the wheel I usually here a few more
Only when turning, all the time, only on bumps? all the time
If its a click thats based on how fast your wheels are turning, I'm going to say to check out your axles.
If its on bumps only, check the sway bar bolts on both sides, along with your upper and lower ball joint bolts and even the bolts on your shocks. I have checked all of these and they are all nice and tight to specs

If its something that only happens when your foot is on the brake, check your calipers and brakes. If its a single click when turning, check everything above plus the steering rack and tie rods. I noticed what looks like a wet spot on the tie rod boot but the sound is not coming from that area anyway.

 

It doesn't sound like the vehicle must even be running or moving for it to happen, right? Sound really is something thats hard to track down since sound likes to bounce and even the ground will deflect it all over the place, not to mention all those other channels. The main key at this point is to get it so you can reliably replicate the sound with out being on the road, then if its not obvious, slowly remove suspicious components until its narrowed down.

Can you get it to do it by bouncing on the bumper or shutting the door? There's a bunch of metal AC lines in front of the radiator, as well as the ac receiver, that could be bouncing around if a hold down screw fell out. If its loose enough that its happening just be getting in the vehicle, if its non-suspension related, it should be fairly easy to rattle it otherwise. Suspension is a bit harder to find though since it already has the weight of the truck on it. Really bouncing on the bumper should be enough to hopefully test out most items of movement in the suspension, while slamming the door would point more towards a rattle due to a loose/missing bolt.

If you think it is suspension related, you might want to try jacking it up and see if something is really loose. Just the act of jacking it up should allow enough movement to make the noise if its ball joint or tie rod related. For sway bar, try jacking up one side at a time. I know you said shocks are good, but it still cant hurt to test them since there's a lot going on inside of them that you cant see. Also, if you really wanted, you could even go as far as to disconnect the shock from the LCA to allow for much freer movement of the whole LCA/UCA assembly. No clue how hard that is on a 2nd gen, but for me, its just one bolt and push it out of the way.

Then there's always other things in the engine area that could've come loose as well and could just be shifting a bit.

 

Yea, vehicle does not have to be on, or moving. I can replicate it all I want, even when I'm under the engine trying to pin point it down. Shutting the door, not so much, getting in the car, yes, bouncing on the bumper yes, but it only clicks once or twice, then I have to move the car a bit. It seems like it has to do with the frame flexing/moving and a bushing maybe that is connected to that somewhere is my best guess. I don't think it is the frame extensions.

It is not suspension related, I recently took apart everything, cleaned it all, then lifted with all new parts.

It doesn't sound like something is loose it more like there is a pressure built up and the sound I hear is it releasing in a bad bushing, or something.

I'll keep at it, thanks for the help.

 

Well, you have the steering rack and sway bar that has bushings that do eventually wear out and are connecting both sides of the vehicle together. (Not talking about the sway bar end links, but where they attach to the under body). Sway bar is one of the easilet things to check, as just disconnect the end links and see if the noise goes away. I would think the rack would also do it while turning the wheel, so thats easily eliminated as well. Cant imagine a 2nd gen having gone through those yet though.

The only other bushings I know about are all suspension related (LCA, UCA, shocks).

Double check the torque on the bolts on the lower ball joint, as that could be a place that binds up, specially if a bolt starts coming out.

I'd also suggest checking weld points.

As far as suspension goes, dont completely rule it out. New doesn't mean good. Defects can sneak past even the best products.

 

i have the exact same problem its the bushings in your lca's the sound is travelling through the frame and echoing in the bumper i brought my truck in to toyota a while back and they wanted 1200 + to redo all bushings and cams and the alignment or you can price out new lca that comes with bj's

 

Is there any other way to fix this? How tough would it be to replace the bushings on your own? Any idea?

 

theres no way to lube them up without dissasembling. however its a pretty big job and chances are everything is seized in there so taking everything apart just to see if it might work isnt worth it. what i would do is take the uca's off and if they are seized in there bring the uca's (both sides) to the stealership or a trustworthy shop and have them deal with it and put new bushings in there (make sure they neverseize the shit out of them) then bring home reinstall (now is a good time to buy and install adjustable bilstein 5100 to fix the rake) and get an alignment asap