Was out doing some minor wheeling yesterday and heard some weird sounds from the rear of the vehicle. Crawled underneath to check today and found one of my rear upper control arms (passenger side) broken. It looks like it had broken before I went out yesterday but the articulation finally moved it out of position yesterday.

Photos of course, bushings were replaced a year and a half ago with energy suspension poly bushings and well lubed



Questions:
1.) Can I fit a set of third gen adjustable upper rear control arms on it?
2.) What is my best option for a beefier replacement if the 3rd gen arms won't fit? I don't have fab skills myself and this is my daily driver so I'd prefer to not have it in a fab shop for weeks.

I've done a bunch of searching and having found an answer to #1 which I found kind of odd at this point. There's also no options (that I could find) for 2nd gen aftermarket rear UCA's.

I should also clarify that I have a coil rear suspension.

TIA!
Phil

 

Example of what I'm looking at, just the upper version of these
https://optoffroad.com/products/opt-...37290469621950

There's other options out there, total chaos makes an entire kit for a third gen with adjustable uppers/lowers and panhard. I don't see why this wouldn't work with a 2nd gen but I don't know enough of the rear suspension minor differences to say otherwise.

 

so the set you linked to will fit a 2nd gen? The limited travel of the 2nd gen stock rear suspension and how the links break so easy makes me want to convert to rear leaf springs.

 

I honestly don't know. It's one of the sets I found that I was interested in possibly trying but I don't know the differences between the 3rd gen and 2nd gen upper arms. If they're close enough (1/8th-1/4in in length) I would expect the third gen adjustables to fit but I haven't found a solid answer to that yet. If it was common practice or worked I would have expected more results in all my searching but I found pretty much 0 answers as to whether or not 3rd gen aftermarket upper rear arms would fit a 2nd gen.

Agreed, with some minor work the 2nd gen rear could flex pretty nicely (at least for what I do 90% of the time) but there's so limited aftermarket support at times it's frustrating. Unless you want to drop a couple thousand dollars and custom fab a triangulated 4 link to replace the stock 4 link.

 

i understand the frustration with the aftermarket support but not a lot of incentive for a company to invest research/time/money on 30+ year old vehicles with a limited market.

 

No doubt -- Not necessarily worth it. It will eventually push me to learn to weld but buying a welder isn't in the cards right now since I just put the 5vz in at the end of summer. I reached out to a local fabricator (he built my sliders actually) hoping he'd be able to throw some upper arms together with johny joints for me. Being adjustable isn't required but wouldn't hurt. I really just need something stronger and if I get something that flexes even a little bit better in the process I won't complain.

I would still really like to know if some of the 3rd gen stuff would fit it looks so similar, even the FJ Cruiser upper arms look to be a similar length.

 

So short update, it looks like I might just have someone beef up the OEM UCA's for the rear at the moment and look into something more in depth in the future.

Some more research revealed these measurements for the 3rd gen rear UCA's. There's a slit difference between 2wd and 4wd models. Will have to go measure the rear UCA's in my truck when I get a chance today.

3rd gen 2wd UCA: 11-11/16 inches or 29.7cm.
3rd gen 4wd UCA*: 12-1/4 inches or 31.1cm.

Edit found from another thread for 2nd gen 4runners
Rear upper link center of bolt to center of bolt is 11 7/8 "

So interestingly enough, if one could find an adjustable 2wd UCA it MIGHT work.
Here's the difference, this math was done before finishing my first cup of coffee
11 14/16 (7/8) = 11.875in = 30.1625cm -- 2nd gen 4runner
11 11/16 = 11.6875 = 29.7cm -- 2wd 3rd gen 4runner

I have confirmed my rear UCA (the intact one) matches the 11 7/8 measurement center of bolt to center of bolt. I reached out to the company I linked above (optoffroad) to see what the min/max lengths of their third gen rear adjustable UCA's are and asking if they have something that would work with the 11 7/8 size I need.

 

Received a response from optoffroad. Their adjustable UCA's are 12in even at their shortest length which is only 1/8th larger than the 2nd gen OEM length. Since I'm slightly lifted I'm not worried about it at all. Currently verifying the mounting width, on the 2nd gen it's 2.5in both for the axle and body mounts and I will be ordering an upper set.

The lowers will not work since they're long enough to shove the axle farther back as compared to the 2nd gen factory length (according to the person I am emailing with).

Phil

 

Another update..
The third gen mounting points are much smaller (skinnier) than the 2nd gen.

Third gen mounting width: 2.115
Second gen: 2.54 (2 9/16ths ish)

I am currently working with OptOffroad to get a set of these uppers available for 2nd gens with the correct sized Johnny joint. I will post up when I have more info.

 

For anyone who finds this searching in the future. The mounting width ended up killing any chance of a company (specifically optoffroad) making a set without a group buy setup and lots of waiting/hassle. I will be making my own and posting up in the build thread I have for this truck in my sig.

Basically they didn't want to send me something that wouldn't fit perfectly. My plan is to use rod ends with a mounting width of 2.36 and spacers on each side to fit correctly.

 

In case someone finds this thread and needs some useful info, quoted from my build thread

 

You did an excellent job from my pov. BigBox Store score on the sand wheels!
Nice welds too. Of course if I ever get around to posting/finishing pics of my build I'm going to claim you came by the house to practice your welds. They are not pretty.

 

Thanks man!!

I will gladly take credit for booger welds haha I have enough in my build thread. Still learning my little MIG 180 machine from eastwood but I've been impressed so far.