Home made boxed control arms

["Turbo-T"]

I believe I read somewhere that you can create a "poor man's" version of boxed control arms by simply welding in some 1/8 inch sheet metal on the bottoms of the stock c channel style control arms?

I'm curious if anyone has done this, and if so how well does it work?

 

[novaderrik]

that's the way it was done for decades before someone got smart and started marketing aftermarket control arms.

 

["Turbo-T"]

Cool. Because I know first hand how much of a bitch it is to swap control arms.

Plus some of us poor guys are looking for low dollar parts to deliver the best bang for the buck.

Now I'm curious as to how well this mod works?

 

[BetMinesFaster]

Cool. Because I know first hand how much of a bitch it is to swap control arms.

Plus some of us poor guys are looking for low dollar parts to deliver the best bang for the buck.

Now I'm curious as to how well this mod works?

UMI's arms are a great bang for the buck. As well as the HR level 1's, Odds are your bushings are weak anyhow, You would not want to create too much heat welding your stockers with the bushings installed, HR makes a boxing kit for stockers if you want to go that route, They really should be removed to weld them, then new bushings installed. By the time you finish them it would have been faster to install the shiney new ones! They are a cake walk to install as well! Hr's are on page 2 of the link, UMI's lower of page 4, I run the UMI's and am very impressed. I have an HR bar, and by looking at that I would have no doubt that the HR's are an excelent choice as well. HTH, Ryan

https://www.gbodyparts.com/index.ph...age=2&osCsid=65ea6b4f5a136a7aff1f268dcfa08fed

 

[aminga]

Here you go.

Control Arm Boxing

HR Parts and stuff did have a boxing kit at one time. Pretty cheap all they did is cut the plates for you.

 

[Grumpy]

UMI's arms are a great bang for the buck. As well as the HR level 1'sBy the time you finish them it would have been faster to install the shiney new ones! They are a cake walk to install as well! Ryan

yup X2 .. buy the time ya add in the new bushings and the plate steel to box em (oh and CLEAN up your old rust ones) I'd just replace them to with new ones that havent been drivin 100k miles and are 20 years old. oh ya..add painting them once you are done Accually I think I have some here (welded up stocks and new poly bushing) with 7k on them if anyone is interested

 

["Turbo-T"]

Last time I went with UMI I had to wait damn near forever for the product to arrive, but they were good quality pieces.

Thanks for the link, though it looks like it says the control arm has to be removed to weld in the plate? Couldn't you just do it with it on the car.....???

 

[VictoryTrans86]

Just for some real-time data....in the old GN, probably pushing 10 yrs now, the stock control arms were pulled, plate welded and bushings replaced. At the time it was a low 12 sec. car, that setup, w/ bilstein shocks BTW was good until 10.75 @ 126 w/ a 1.61 60ft. The car had more power in it, but wouldn't really 60ft for crap. Since there wasn't as much available at the time, Hotchkis upper and lowers and tubular brace went on w/ QA-1 shocks. 60 fts instantly dropped to 1.4's and thats when it really started pulling the front wheels. Moral of the story is....they will work for quite a while, decently effective at that, but there is better options out there, and for the time and money output, it would be in your best interest to go aftermarket

 

[Grumpy]

Last time I went with UMI I had to wait damn near forever for the product to arrive, but they were good quality pieces.

Thanks for the link, though it looks like it says the control arm has to be removed to weld in the plate? Couldn't you just do it with it on the car.....???

well if your heating up the arm welding you will maybe melt whats left of your 20 year old bushings that should be replaced anyway.. We got UMIs in a few days .. The stock replacement ones worked great in Melissa's GN .. hmmm be fun cleaning the control arms and welding them still in the car

 

[VictoryTrans86]

Also to answer your last question...they COULD be done on the car, but why? The uppers would be a pain, and your gonna wind up melting or at best, weakening your already 20+ year old bushings w/ excessive heat

 

[novaderrik]

Just for some real-time data....in the old GN, probably pushing 10 yrs now, the stock control arms were pulled, plate welded and bushings replaced. At the time it was a low 12 sec. car, that setup, w/ bilstein shocks BTW was good until 10.75 @ 126 w/ a 1.61 60ft. The car had more power in it, but wouldn't really 60ft for crap. Since there wasn't as much available at the time, Hotchkis upper and lowers and tubular brace went on w/ QA-1 shocks. 60 fts instantly dropped to 1.4's and thats when it really started pulling the front wheels. Moral of the story is....they will work for quite a while, decently effective at that, but there is better options out there, and for the time and money output, it would be in your best interest to go aftermarket

i don't suppose you ever tried the tubular brace with the stock arms, or tried stiffer bushings- like del-a-lums from Global West- in the stock arms before replacing then with the aftermarket arms?

 

[VictoryTrans86]

No I sure didn't, I suppose it would've had a similar effect. At the time, the goals for the car were much further than any stock arm config would take us, and the Hotchkis setup w/ the old ATR sway bar took the car to low 9's w/ high 1.3 60's. I highly doubt that could've been achieved w/ stock boxed arms, but maybe someone will prove me wrong. My only point was its all depending on your goals. It may be a cheaper quick fix now, but at some point you'll have to splurge for the aftermarket stuff

 

["Turbo-T"]

Ok thanks.

I didn't think that tack welding on the plate would create enough heat to travel to the rubber bushings and melting them.

All I know is when I was replacing the lower arms on an A body I did it one at a time as told and the damn axle got out of geometry. It was a PITA getting it alighned back up. I didn't even attempt the upper arms.

Plus being on a budget I figured I could help stiffen up the control arms. But it looks as if my best option is to just replace the stockers with aftermarkets.

 

[novaderrik]

there have been many, many cars that have gone insanely fast using the stock arms.
i just can't wrap my brain around how an aftermarket arm can be stronger than a stock arm- all of the loading (except for the sway bar, of course) is in a straight line along the length of the arm, so there is no way that they can bend. upgrade the bushings and get a proper body mounted sway bar, and the stockers would be plenty good.

 

["Turbo-T"]

I would guess the stock arms were made of a thinner stamped steel than the aftermarket boxed ones, and I would think the missing bottom piece would also contribute to weakness....??

My car has a stock rear sway bar....is that good or bad?

Perhaps an airbag or two and some M/T ET street drag radials could work wonders for me?

 

[VictoryTrans86]

I would guess the stock arms were made of a thinner stamped steel than the aftermarket boxed ones, and I would think the missing bottom piece would also contribute to weakness....??

My car has a stock rear sway bar....is that good or bad?

Perhaps an airbag or two and some M/T ET street drag radials could work wonders for me?

Yes the stock arms are a weaker steel than aftermarket arms, and yes the fact that its open channeled is a drastic disadvantage. Like I said, if you don't want to spend the money on aftermarket arms, or if your the type that wants to fab your own stuff, boxed stock arms WILL work, like I said, I had them on a car that ran 10's. It just needs to be done right (removed, welded, bushings replaced) Also IMO, the stock sway bar is also a hinderance. If you can afford the HR bar, go with that. I've never used one but have heard great things, and I'm assuming you won't need bags, like the Wolfe bar? Maybe someone could chime in on that.....but worst case, try to find one of the old ATR bars for cheap or something similar, w/ some bags and a good sticky tire, and you shouldn't have any problems for a while, or at least until you wanna put down serious power

 

[VictoryTrans86]

i just can't wrap my brain around how an aftermarket arm can be stronger than a stock arm-

Are you serious about that? Yes, like I've stated a few times, you can go fairly quick on modded stockers. But have you actually saw a good aftermarket arm side by side w/ a stocker? It's like night and day. In my mind, there is absolutely no question that they are stronger. If that was the case, there would be no market for them, who wants to spend money on something that doesn't make a difference?

I had stock boxed control arms, poly bushings, Airbags, ATR sway bar and bilstein shocks. 1.61 60ft...also not an average, but a best. Usually was around 1.66-1.70. Made roughly 30-40 passes w/ this config

Hotchkis arms, now that I remember, NO tubular braces, (as I just found them yesterday in my garage), ATR bar, bags, QA1 shocks. With nothing changed besides control arms and shocks, 60's averaged 1.48-1.50 w/ a best of 1.45. This is no coincidence and I doubt just shocks helped pick up this much.

Also I wanted to note, I eventually had the same problem w/ this setup, once the car starting making over 800rwhp. A wolfe bar and tubular upper and lowers were swapped in, but never got a chance to run it. I'm not giving opinions here, but actually real world numbers, I'm sure there are plenty others that could chime in and give instances where they picked up over stock arms

 

[sd-slider]

A pretty detailed process from a cat over on the Buicks.net board.

Building Your Own Trailing Arms

Just apply any different numbers from the G-body dimensions and you are golden. :smile:

 

[Grumpy]

A pretty detailed process from a cat over on the Buicks.net board.

Building Your Own Trailing Arms

Just apply any different numbers from the G-body dimensions and you are golden. :smile:

ya have to join to read it I value my time so I went with aftermarkets .. BUT I would like to see what they did and how they worked.

 

[charlief1]

One thing I discovered is that you can get all 4 arms from Speedway for $118 without bushings plus shipping. I decided to box my own arms and also found out that the 4th gen Camaro lowers are the same as the G body lowers.:biggrin: I did an extreme version of boxing which included sorounding the bushing area completely and then closing the bottoms in. Didn't add that much metal but it's gonna be a lot stiffer so it will work well.:biggrin: Here's a few pics for you.