WHAT THE F@%$#@ ... HOW DOES THIS HAPPEN?

[Meintii]

So check out what happened to me the other day as I tried to pull to the side of the road in front of my friends house. I thought I had run over some concrete thing on the side of the road, and then I lost brake pressure and thought... great.. Little did I know..

As you can see, it pulled my new strut bearing out of the mount. Also, we noticed the new stainless class 8 bolts I used to attach the bottom of the strut to the control arm had sheered in half, and there were no heads on the bolts anymore... My question is WHY WHY WHY DID THIS HAPPEN?

We are all completely bamboozled by this and cannot figure out what could have made this. Our suspicion is that the fastenal bolts failed..

[rogerspeed]

where the bolts you used broke; I'd have reused the factory bolts with new safety wire. It also appears your lower balljoint is mounted on top rather than under the control arm. stay safe

edit: the factory bolts have an extention drilled for wire, installed it looks like a stud with a nut, all three wired together

[cyclopticgaze]

Yeah, the ball joints should come up through the control arm. Might have changed the geometry enough to transmit added stress upwards. Like you said, it looks like the three bolts connecting the pitman arm to the bottom of the strut tube are what gave out. Did you hit the curb with that right-front wheel or take any potholes?

Up top, the strut bearing stayed put, but the washers above and below the metal sleeve look small in diameter (too small or did they tear out and get stripped?). Whatever, I think the bottom of the strut dropped/slid out and pulled everything else with it.

[c.d.iesel]

using used screws? wrong screws?

if the 3-holes in the steering arm are too large - that would permit

movement of the strut bottom causing the screws to snap?

correct screws 32 21 1 113 178 sug. list $7.40 each

watch the other side!

lucky you weren't killt

[jgerock]

Edit - CD you must have hit the button just as I was typing.

Wow Zac - not sure I've seen that too much. If I read your post right, you used Grade 8 hex bolts in the bottom strut mount instead of the stock funky ones.

Were they the correct pitch?

Did you recently replace those upper strut mounts?

Check the other side yet?

Sorry it happened to you!

BTW - I saw an early 2000's Honda Accord with collapsed front end on the Interstate earlier this week. The entire strut/caliper/tire was jammed under the car.

[Meintii]

Wow Zac - not sure I've seen that too much. If I read your post right, you used Grade 8 hex bolts in the bottom strut mount instead of the stock funky ones.

Were they the correct pitch?

Did you recently replace those upper strut mounts?

Check the other side ?

What I did to get the bolts I used was take the original bolts that were used up to fastenal, and asked them to give me the same thing but in stainless so I would never have to deal with the rusty bolts again. The strut mounts are brand new.

I had to go out of town that day and have not had a chance to look at the other side yet... I looked at the picture online of what this stuff looks like assembled(realoem) and I though I had the ball joint installed right when I put them on... It seems like it would be hard to install it wrong

[Mike_R]

check the archives this is something we have seen before. It looks like the failure this time was from the top not the botom. failure from the bottom & the strut does not come out like that. failure form the top ... well you see the result. I would concentrate on the top strut bearing & that caused the whole thing to fall out blowing out the lower mount from the stress.

[boxy02]

I don't know much about the strength of a stainless bolt in this type of application, but if you don't want to deal with future rusty bolts use the stock bolts with anti-seize on the threads. Than safety wire them up, they will work loose if you don't.

It'll be interesting to see what the bolts look like on the bottom of your strut, sheared? missing?

The upper strut top washer looks a bit small (diameter-wise) to me. Could it have just pulled the steel insert and washer all the way through? Glad you weren't on the hi-way hitting a bump or pot hole! Sorry this happened to you!

[Harv]

Stainless hardware is not as strong as you think. Some of it can be very soft. Was it safety wired? My guess is that the bolts worked loose, sheared off under braking, pulling the strut out of the mount and under the car.

Bummer

Now I have to dig into my front suspension because I have my ball joints just like yours. Pluss I just safety wired em up after I put the motor in. I used grade 8 cap head screws and washers on mine.

John

[02tom]

Sorry man, I feel your pain. I was under the impression that you couldn't get stainless with the same strength as a grade 8.8 or 10.9 metric. I'm no expert, but this is what I vaguely recall from past conversations with people that might know.

[wegweiser]

For future reference:

I never....*NEVER* use stainless fasteners on load bearing / suspension/safety assemblies. Aside from usually being of lesser strength, they can gall (damage the threads) upon assembly, making disassembly a real nightmare.

I use only 12.9 fasteners on this application, when the original ones are not useable, AND use blue loctite. When using factory bolts, I always use stainless safety wire and again...loctite. I'd NEVER use anti-seize on these threads....but I *DO* add a few drops of paint on top of the one hole that goes all the way through the strut base, to prevent moisture from entering the threaded hole after assembly.

Even with the body damage and inconvenience, you got lucky....very very lucky. Imagine that happening at 70 mph next to a schoolbus full of kids!

[rey949]

WOw that is really too bad. Looks like you have a nylock nut intsead of a crown nut and split pin setup for the ball joint. That is not an accesible location to check for snugness of the nut so i would think you would want that in there as well.

Our prayers are with you and your car....

Rey

[BillWilliams]

Now, Zack, sorry for your misfortune, you have put so much time into your car. I too say stainless bolts are softer or more brittle, how ever you want to say it, than steel bolts. I suspect this to be the issue for your failure.

Hope you can get it back together soon.

Again, I feel for you but to think what would have happened if you were at speed when this happened. You may be one fortunate young man.

Ok, fellows, I have both of my ball joints on both cars setting on top of the control arms. One of the cars came to me that way and I have not touched it. (Thanks Andy) Not saying that makes it right.

I looked at the factory blue book and I can not tell which way the ball joints sit, up through the bottom of the control arm or sit on top.

I respect those saying they go up through. But do others, other than Harv, have their ball joints on top of the control arms? Is that really dangerous?

[rey949]

Hey guys here is what we see in the parts manual. the ball joint goes ON TOP of the control arm. I am not sure that the abll joint would work properly below...I am not expert...here is the pic

Rey

[wegweiser]

I believe the "correct" factory mounting of the balljoints is ABOVE the control arm, (as evidenced by the factory RIVETING the originals that way!) but I usually run them THROUGH the arm - so in the event that the nuts/bolts get loose or shear, the joint is held captive by it's base under the arm. This is unrelated to the failure of the special safety wired bolts.

This method limits the ability to turn the wheels fully left or right when the car is on jackstands/lift....that's the downside. ie: The steering arm will hit the control arm when the suspension is in full droop. I learned of this assembly method from a 2002 rally / competition driver/ BMW tech about 20 years ago.