After taking my truck into the shop today to get the shocks recharged and the suspension adjusted, I was called up with some bad news. Apparently I have to replace all the hiem joints in my front end; like 2 big ones ($140 a peice) and 6 small ones ($65 a peice)!!!! So with labor and everything, they estimate around $1000. Damnit. So I was wondering if this seems like an absurd amount of money for something like that, because that money is like a good chunk of change that can go towards a brand new ESB fabrications or total chaos kit. What do you think? Any help or advice is appreciated.

 

That sounds like a lot, but what kind of suspension do you have? Are we talking about upper/lower uniballs and steering heims?

 

Edge 3.0 (aka Flicker), it is a lot of money but the labor is what kills you. It sounds about right to me. I would recommend doing it yourself to save money. Oh and for general knowlege, ESB Fabrications is out of business.

 

WHAT ESB is out of business? That sucks! Lol nice I guess you found my alter ego on race dezert, what gave me away Yeah I calculated it out and it was only like 600 or 700 max for all the heims which means I am eating like 300-400 in labor. Then again I don't know how easy it is to replace those things. I have a long travel suspension made by inland trucks back when they still did fabrication work. Anyway Motorsports Plus out here said that when they jacked up the truck they noticed there was a crap load of play and the thing rattled and squeaked... other than that though everything was good. Anyway, your only in Ventura yota82, thats cool, I am from Moorpark out in ventura county also.

 

What gave you away was the "Live Life On The Edge" signature and the "Help fixing my Yota's stance" thread. Yeah ESB is out of business. Really sucks! I am fimiliar with Moorpark, it's Kraproom spelled backwords LOL! Do you ever go to any races? I pit/chace for the Total Chaos trucks Vance/Helton/Metcho. Helton and Metcho are testing the new TC Gen. III kit. Here are some secret cell phone spy pics from Metcho's truck, he lives down the street from me:




Back on subject. $300-$400 isn't bad for all the labor. But changing heims isn't that hard.

 

That is one sweet truck, I was waiting for that front end to come out, but I don't know how much it is going to cost. Probably a pretty penny. That is practically exactly how I want my truck. As far as the heims, I might just wait for the TC kit to come out and run with what I have, just carefully. I dunno do you need to machine press the joints out, or do you jsut sorta push em out? And yes I am quite familiar that my city is spell kraproom backwards I actually just got my truck and I was interested in coming out to a few races. And I was wondering, what glass is that guy running in the front to cover that Gen III kit, like hannemann or is it giant or something? Back to the heims, is it somethign I could do if I had the parts and some pretty basic tools? I mean I have some mechanical knowledge, but I'm no genius.

 

The fiberglass is Giant Motorsports Tundra 1 piece clip. The truck has to be pretty wide to run it. Heims are easy they unthread and the new ones thread back in. The gen. III kit is going to be expensive because TC has to modify the spindle. No word on price but I would guess around 5K.

 

Cool thanks for the info, do you know where I could go about getting my hands ond some heims?

 

http://www.ballisticfabrication.com/

 

There is kartek in corona. If you want something closer you could try american off road in thousand oaks or fulcrum motorsports in simi.

 

I haven't heard of american off road or Fulcrum maybe I should check them out. Motorpsort Plus did some good work for me, but $1000 is pretty steep for somethign I may be able to pull off myself. By the way Pinnacle, how do you like your Gen II caddy kit? I was thinking about putting one on my truck and making it 4x4 again, but then I would have to go through the hassle of putting the transfer case and front diff back in. Anyway, once I get all this done, we should all hit up Gormon or pismo

Oh yeah, and I almost forgot, how would I know what heim to get/order, would I just have to take my truck there and have them figure it out or something? Anyway thanks for all the help

 

I love my caddy kit. The reason I got it was to keep 4wd. The kit handles really weel and since I got the rear suspension done it feels like the whole truck is a lot more balanced.

They should be able to tell what size the heims are by looking at them. There is probably 2 1 1/4" on the spindle and the rest are 3/4 or 1", if its the kit im thinkg of.

To get the joints out all you do is loosen the jam nut and twist them out.

 

What in the freak is a Hiem joint? LOL

 

LOL its the shiney ball where a bunch of parts connect and pivot.....that's about the only way I know how to put it I believe I have 2 1/4" for each spindle and then 2 7/8" for each tire rod, making a grand total of eight. But if I can do it myself I might as well try, because 1k isn't chump change.

 

The labor I guess comes in where you have to disassemble most the front suspension.

 

I just had my suspension looked at, and apparently it is only the two heims on each tie rod that is causing that problem. The heims on the tie rod were actually a lot more accessable than I thought they were, it was only a patter of removing like 3 huge bolts and a bunch of retaining nuts. Apparently the Heims on the spindles aren't wiggling besides a little movement from a sorta loose wheel bearing, so I was told those wouldn't need to be changed. I called Kartek this morning and I am having them make me a custom tie rod that is both left and right, because the one I have on my truck is both right and right for some god forsaken reason. So now that I know that I only need the 4 heim joints on the end of the tie rods replaced and not the 2 big ones on the spindle, I be able to save some money. All in all it is going to be like $65-$75 for a pair of custom chromoly tie rods, and then about $160 for 4 3/4" FK Chromoly heims, does that seem fair? I mean it is a crap load cheaper than the $1000 Motorsports Plus said I absolutely needed to I replace, by almost like $750. I dunno go figure, and if the ones on the spindle eventually go bad, I can do those my self I guess.

 

Iam glad the price going down.... btw NICE truck dood.... May I "borrow" it for a trip to thr Rubi? You wouldn't mind would you?

 

LOL..well you are a fellow toyota owner... But yeah I just ordered the tie rods, the 4 3/4" heims, and the lock nuts, and I ended up spending around $250 with shipping and it should be here by wednesday. So yeah I'm pretty stoked.