excluesive

iTrader: (10)

sounds like a safe rule of thumb

motolex722

iTrader: (4)

Ok guys here's my update. Today I took the time to do a few tests. first i took pics of the ride height im currently riding at and measured from the ground to the middle of each fender.

Before: with spc uca, bc racing coils and Exact RCA's.

Driver Side:




Passenger Side:







Next i pulled the car in the garage, jacked it up and snapped various suspension shots before removing the RCA.




I shot some spray paint about a month ago over the area that had exposed metal from the Upper Control Arms hitting to prevent any rust.



Pic of the RCA installed:



Pic of one of the areas that the UCA was hitting the body. You can see see it started to notch the body.


Also the red dot in the black is from where the top of the camber/caster nut hits the body.




Next i removed the RCA's which gave me a little more than an inch between the top of the UCA and the fender well but when i dropped the car back on the ground i gained a little more than an inch of ride height. Sorry in my frustration of why this is i forgot to take pics but i then i thought lets sweat it out a little more & experiment a little. I decided to re-install my OEM UCA arms and see if my ride height decreased w/o any use of RCA's.

But to my surprise, after re-installing the OEM upper control arms there was no change! So now i am really stumped. I guess it is not the SPC Upper control arms after all affecting my change in ride height.

I jacked the car up and dumped my coil overs to their max and this is my result:


It's not as low as when i started my project today with the SPC UCA & RCA but close. I thought these coils can go a lot lower, no? Maybe someone else running BC Racing Coils on OEM Suspension and NO RCA's can chime in. In the instructions i got with the BC Coils it says specifically not to change the preload...but when i look at the coil over, it looks like there are ALOT of threads left even when the coil over is at its max lowering height. Could it be that the preload was set wrong from the factory and that is why i'm having height discrepancies? I guess I'll call BC racing over the next few days to converse with them my problems as well.

In conclusion:
I guess its not the SPC UCA arms after all that is giving me my height discrepancy. Although, i don't think SPC UCA's are well suited for drivers looking to go much lower than where i was when i started today due to the fact that it hits in a lot of places in the fender well and my bigger concern, the ball joint can not take the extreme angle of daily driving over even small bumps. The ball joint actually runs out of room to flex and in turn, sort of wants to pop out. When i send these ball joints in to SPC for warranty purposes, they will be able to see groves in the ball joint where it wants to keep flexing but can't. Sorry for the long post but hopefully it helps to solve some issues in the future.

Shout out to Travis & SPC, your customer service thus far has been excellent.

sam430

iTrader: (10)

I think the RCA is raising the UCA but the height of the RCA... it also drops the car by the height of RCA. Like I told another person, don't know if it was you... but the variable here is the RCA and everything else is constant. So, spend a little more experiment to understand what the RCA does to the suspension system.

It would be cool to have more movement on the Joints on the UCA... I guess you can get stiffer springs and shocks to prevent the joints from stretching... or redesign RCA to extend out and bend the joints down and inward (when installed, the uca will go up and because it was bent inward, it'll sit perpendicular to the bolt on part... very unlikely you will get a redesign)


But again, you can run it without RCA but adjust the coil. From looking at the coil, I don't think it will go lower... you will have to dump BC and get something else...otherwise, you will need to lower the perch... you got the bump stop to protect it from bottoming out. It will void your warranty.

BC should have listed the max that it can be lowered publicly. I think it's listed in teh manual.

sam430

iTrader: (10)

edit... lowering the perch doesn't solve the UCA hitting the top... I guess you will have to wait for the experts/OG ... Goodluck.

SpecProd

This is one of the issues I stated before, the RCA will lower the actual ride height, but it will push the UCA up. I dont have the measurements off hand but if someone has a stock one that could illustrate. For our purposes lets say on a stock car there is 5 in between the UCA and the fender. Now add a 3 in drop and a 1 in raise from the RCA, combine that with 1/2in higher ball joint and your at 4.5in, leaving 1/2 travel where the factory had 5, with all these suspension changes and the standard operation of the suspension, those components have to go somewhere, the place? The upper fender. There is only so much you can do, I've seen some of the air ride threads with people clearancing that fender area, as a application becomes more popular to modify these issues come up but this has been a VERY informative thread.



For others with this issue, as stated before the ONLY way a UCA could affect ride height is if it was installed improperly. If you did not preload the suspension and torqued the UCA bolts the car would actually be sitting on the bushings, this would raise the height of the car, it would also trash your bushings very quickly. Always take pre and post measurements to confirm and always have suspension parts installed by a competent and qualified shop.




First off, not a problem, we are always here to help and I cant wait to see the joints to see if there is an issue. To speak to your point, to make a extended range ball joint would most likely take up more room, perhaps even compounding this issue, but we will certianly take a look at what we can do. As stated, if you blew out our OEM joints, dont expect much more from ours. We engineer these as OEM replacement /adjustable arms, As I stated its impossible to engineer for every height or every combination of parts, at that point they would certainly not be cost effective.


Look forward to seeing those joints.



Travis

SpecProd

Also I just confirmed with our engineer about the extended range, it COULD be done, but it would be taller and wider, the ball and stud need a place to go. Out side of this realm, but take a look at our control arms for a toyota tacoma, they have the opposite problem, as they go higher they run into issues. We designed an extended range ball joint and you can see how it has that tall top and thick spacer plate is to get that range, that would make this issue even worse.



Travis

GS300ToM

iTrader: (32)

dam......i wanted these soo bad to correct my fronts camber but i drive daily lower than him about 1.5inch lower

vwynn

iTrader: (4)

cutting the top area would provide more play in the suspension if your shocks let.

SpecProd

Again, every suspension setup is different, Just because you are lower does not necessarily mean our parts wont work. In this case I think its the combination of the bump stops in the BC coils and the UCA that's causing the issue in this thread.

cjames235

iTrader: (10)

technically yes, but if the ball joint is already out of travel it will only compound the problem if you let the UCA go up even farther into the shock tower

GS300ToM

iTrader: (32)

imma just try it for the hell of it and see what happen... my goal is to run -2 camber up front since it sitting at -3...

EXACT RCA + SPC UCA + Megan coils... next month tho

sam430

iTrader: (10)

THat's why I suggest pre-bending the ball joint inward a few degrees in stock form. When it gets loaded on lowered cars, it'll sit normally (which will give the ball joint more room to play). Not too much bend because when the car goes in the air, the tire will go down, UCA will come down as car is in air. That would also bend the ball joint the opposite direction. Not often that it'll bend the opposite direction though.

or, make it curved...as you extend the ball joint out, it progressively curve inward.... as u move the ball joint inward, the ball joint will progressively point outward. I think this would work for all setup.

motolex722

iTrader: (4)

you're going to hit in a lot of places due to the fact that the spc uca are a little wider and taller in the balljoint area and the arms are a little thicker than OEM.

motolex722

iTrader: (4)

i understand what everyone's said thus far with how the whole RCA works. My problem now is that i'm out of adjustment in my front coilovers. I know these coil overs should go much lower b/c i've seen plenty of pics of people running bc racing coils on stock arms w/o RCA's.

And yes i always preload the suspension before finally tightening down the arms.

sam430

iTrader: (10)

I just installed the BC today... You can only go so low in the front. I think the shock body is kinda long. I'm going to add my RCA this weekend to drop it some more.

As for the UCA... many people are cutting a hole (where the it's hitting) to go lower. no one ever complained about the joint being over extended though... Can someone who've cut up thier stuff check the upper ball joints to see if it's over extended??