Will be replacing the two front lower control arms, and sway bar links and bushings, and front brake rotors and pads.
while we are there, wonder if its a good idea to replace the two front upper control arms? they look fine from outside.
My mobile mechanic said the control arms on GL rarely go bad, the suspension parts of GL are massive and strong.
He himself is a big fan of GL & ML.
And on this forum there are very few posts on control arm replacement, maybe they do last very long?
Thanks in advance for your input,

 

The arms themselves do not go bad, but the rubber bushings inside separate.

Possibly this could be deferred by lubricating the inside sleeve of the bushing with silicone grease? Or maybe the rubber just decays through normal environmental processes.

A similar separation happened on my swaybar bushings, but I figured out it was due to a flawed design: The inner sleeve of the bushing is clamped to the swaybar, forcing it to tear the bushing.

 

Upper control arms are cheap, too. "While you are at it ..."

User StradaRedlands just changed his upper arms. Bushing inside was shredded.

 

will replace those arms then, saving labor cost in the long run.
My mobile mechanic is really passionate on the GL and ML.
I'll probably keep the GL for a long time with his help.

 

Yeah sounds like you have a real gem there. May I suggest remembering him on Christmas. And Valentine's Day.

 

They really only need replacing if they're cracked or torn, but at this age it felt prudent to just do them all now. They get softer with age too, so the ride will firm up somewhat with new bushings.

Just don't cheap out on brand. Lemforder is a very good one.

 

Delphi is manufactured in the same country - Turkey - so I am very curious as to the comparison, especially long term.

The suspension components are so simple. Literally just cast steel and rubber. Hard to believe they are treated as gourmet items; even harder to believe there is legitimacy to that approach.

 

Yes FCP also sells Delphi control arms along side the official oem ones. And my mechanic recommended Delphi.

 

I did all of them with Lemforder parts from FCP Euro. Beware:

Sway bar links had uneven length bolts. From memory the longer end attaches to the strut.
Torque the bushings and sway bar links with the car on the ground, or they will loosen. Use new fastners with locktite to keep them tight.

You'll love how it rides. My experience was the upper arm bushings are the softest and were more damaged than the lower arm bushes. If your changing bushes and not arms, at least on the lower ones, be ready for a fight.

 

thanks for the tips, will change the arms. sway bar links & bushings, front brake rotors & pads, and both tie rod ends.

 

l think I also used Lemforder for the links and ended up having a problem with the nuts they supplied. They would bind up while you were tightening them. I ended up just reusing the old nuts. It was the first problem I’ve had with the brand.

The lower arms are beefier because it’s what takes most of the abuse and stress. The rest of it doesn’t take nearly as much oddly enough.

I’ll second that its bushings weren’t fun to replace, even with a bench press. Not something I’d want to do again!

 

The upper arms set the amount of caster, by their fore-aft position relative to the lower, and how much the camber changes with suspension deflection, by their angle and relative length. The lower control arms are responsible for the fore-aft position of the wheels, so they sustain all the acceleration and braking forces. The upper arm bushings have to be softer than the lower because the arm, being shorter, turns more when the suspension deflects. Of course, this also means that the control arm exerts less control over the suspension geometry ... and even less after the bushing shreds, as it eventually does.

Curious about the nuts binding. Usually that is galling, where little beads of metal come loose and gum up the threads. This happens with aluminum and stainless steel, but typically not normal steel. It can be avoided by applying anti seize compound to the threads.

 

It was the oddest thing. I looked inside the new and unused nuts and nothing seemed out of the ordinary. It was almost like the thread measurement was close but not exactly right.

 

Crazy. Welcome to our new world, in which any kind of sloppiness is shrugged at, I guess.

 

I shrug now, but I wasn't when I had to pull the sawzall out to cut off a stuck link that was brand new. Given that the old nuts worked, I was grateful it wasn't an issue that couldn't be overcome, or that manifested on the road.

 

Chiming in as I just did this process... 117k miles on the GL. Lower control arms are still good, but my uppers were shot. All four bushings were blown out. Control arm links and bushings are bad as well... am in the process of swapping those out. I'm using a mix of Lemforder and Delphi. Both made in Turkey (Consider donating WCK), I betcha on the same assembly line. I would recommend doing the uppers as well. Parts are inexpensive, I don't know what the labor will end up being on top of the rest.