Well, it's about damn time

[jamal]

Last November, I stupidly slid into a curb, bent a control arm, scuffed up my two right wheels, and had to get towed home. Also I had to wait for about 4 hours for a tow truck because they came with a regular truck first after I had specified flat bed over and over again on the phone. AAA covered the tow.

That day, I did some online shopping for a new control arm, and got one for $35 shipped out of a junkyard in colorado. It came the next week, and I went to work on repairing the car.



Yeah, that doesn't look right.



Not right at all.



Hmmm.. There's the problem.



The endlink was rubbing on the tie rod, which seems to be slightly not perfectly straight. I'll see what the alignment shop has to say about it. The strut and everything else seems fine, though.



New control arm:



So, yeah, I went to work on installing the control arm, and managed to strip a few turns of the threads. [expletive deleted]. This turned my day long repair into a long ordeal of me sitting on my ass.

I went to pep-boys, autozone, and some other random stores in the ghetto looking for a 14x1.5 helicoil kit. I found one at a place called California Tool, and it was $85. Oh, wait, with the student discount it's only $76. Alright!

I didn't really feel like spending that, and doing all the work at the time because I had a bunch of hard engineering finals. Plus I had use of my friend's car, who was in Argentina. I drove that around, and he got back the day before I flew home for winter break, so my car just sat behind my house.

I got back, bought the helicoil and the appropriate bit (9/16 w/ 1/2" shank, $13), and realized I didn't have a drill big enough to hold it. Yay. There went another $50 at home depot, although I'll probably return it. So, today I finally put in the helicoil, installed the new arm, and threw on some fresh pads, and moved my car for the first time in over two months.

I'm still working on that WRX/H6 brake swap, and I just found all the stuff I need for the rear, slightly used, for $120. Alright!

So, in conclusion, parts cost me $35, and tools cost me $150. Plus I need an alignment and ruined a wheel I planned to sell. Everyone can feel free to call me a idiot now.

[Psychoreo]

idiot

lol...not really, it just sucks that when one thing goes wrong(sliding into the curb) everything else goes wrong (stripped bolt and bent "new control arm")

[jamal]

There's nothing wrong with the new control arm. I guess it kind of seems like that the way, though. I didn't pay much attention in writing class.

So, just took it out to bed in the new pads (flower street works pretty well at 2am).

There are definitely some issues I need to work out. I put on the old messed up wheel, which has messed up tread from rubbing on the fender, along with being bent, and got quite a bit of noise from it. Hopefully it's just the tire and not a wheel bearing or something. I also noticed the steering was a bit off. So, yeah. definitely need that alignment and some new dubs. It's nice that I have another set of WRX take-offs sitting outside my room.

My transmission leaked a fair amount over the last two months, to the point where it was slipping. I've read around some more and it sounds like it might just be the filler tube. It leaks more when I'm parked on an incline. The car also stalled on me once, but I've been on E for over two months so that might be the problem. I'm going to seafoam it, and change the plugs and oil, so hopefully that and some fresh gas will fix those problems.

[scottzg]

hooray!

you should celebrate with a run up glendora on saturday

[jamal]

That'd be cool. I'll see what I get done and how it's running by the end of the week. I might go to mammoth, though.

[Busdriver]

Hey Jamal, did you damage the control arm before in a wheel bearing replacement or something along those lines? I remember seeing a pic of it with a crease?!?

[jamal]

I bent it like last november, and then it sat in my lot because I stripped a few turns of the threads on one of the holes in the chassis that the transverse link on the control arm mounts to. I got a replacement the next week but just finally put it last week because I had to buy $150 in tools to fix it and went home for winter break for a month. The old pictures were from when I first did it.

I only bent one control arm.

[jamal]

Oh great fantastic.

So I was getting some sort of a humming type noise coming from the wheel area that I assumed was due to the curbed wheel being out of balance. I was just driving it to work, which is about 5 blocks away, so I took my time in replacing the wheels with my new ones. The other day I switched them and washed my car and stuff, and was driving it around a bit more. Guess what: still getting that sound. My best guess is the wheel bearing. Later today I'll poke around a bit more and see what's up. I suppose it could also have something to do with the steering or axle. The ball joint and strut top are in good shape.

Bonus picture of the damaged wheel and my new paint job.





An idiot I live with decided it would be a good idea to paint the wall my car was parked three feet away from while I was home for winter break. Hopefully a claybar will take most of that off. My car needs a good detailing anyway.


Update:
jacked up that corner, and there isn't any play in any direction. I'm going to take out the axle I guess and see if I can gather anything from that.

Update 2: Definitely the wheel bearing.