I bought one of those cheap 10 piece front end suspension and steering kits on EBay to redo my front end. Yes, this is the proper kit for my truck!

the upper ball joints are garbage. When the nut was torqued, they pulled through the hole!
the inner tie rods nut is bottomed-out and the rod is not tight on both sides.
the idler arm castle nut is far away from the cotter pin hole.

Quality control is horrible for this. I should have known, you get what you pay for. I bought replacements for the kit at my auto parts store and they work just fine.

Be warned!

 

Thanks, but your post is less helpful than you might think. eBay doesn't have any particular requirement that items sold there be poor quality, so just because you got a bad set through eBay hardly means that every kit sold on eBay is to be avoided.

If you think there is something distinctive (a picture of the package? the manufacturer's name?) you could share that. The seller's name isn't so helpful, unless you thought he/she was party to some misrepresentation.

 

Most of the things I buy on EBay are decent. My post was meant to bring awareness to potential problems that may be encountered.

The $71 10pc kit that I bought has very poor quality Chinese parts that do not fit correctly. If somebody buys one of these ultra low priced kits and installs it without double checking the install, it could be dangerous.for them and other drivers on the road. I would venture to say these sub $100 unbranded kits all come from the same place.

I am waiting on a reply email from the seller to give them a chance to respond, If they don't respond and try to fix this, I will post the company name. A pic of the idler arm...





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After sending Detroit Axle an email asking about the problems with the parts in my kit and not getting a reply, I called them. They asked for the part numbers and were willing to exchange the parts after verifying they were for my truck. The shipping was $25. I decided not to do this as I bought the needed parts locally. A further check on the defective parts has revealed the conical taper is shorter than the original part and narrower at it widest point than the original part. This allowed the castle nut to bottom out before proper seating of the joint. See photos below, Original Toyota part is on the right.

 

As long as people think they are getting a super deal this stuff will be sold

For the price really what did you expect??

As long as I can get Suspension and steering parts from Toyota that will be my first choice.

 

I won't buy Toyota OEM parts anymore for my 400k 1st gen 4runner. It is pretty long in the tooth. I do go with the better brands from aftermarket using rock auto and amazon.

 

Depends on the part if oem or not....for instance on my 1989 the steering stabilizer by Monroe is $37, and oem is $173....the Monroe has been working fine for 3 years now

 

I put one of those cheap kits in about a yr ago. Street/highway and light trails only but if there are any faiklres I will post them here.