control arm knock knock knockin'

[strodda]

i just got an alignment, and i noticed today that when i go over a bump at 60+ i hear a hard knock. im assuming its the upperarm hitting the well since they moved it about +2degrees.

is there an easy way to fix it? and also, will it damage anything? or is it just annoying?

[born2speed]

Hey man I finally found someone with the same problem. I just discovered what is does, becuase it has been happening to me for 3 years and I thought the sound was the bottom of my car hitting the ground. It is real bad because now the control arms have dented my inner fender causing paint to chip in the engine bay and now my control arms are bent alittle.

I'm still trying to figure out what to do.

[strodda]

holy shit, i forgot about this post
well since its already bent your arm, just have a shop bend out the spot more. im not sure if a bent arm is really bad, im sure you can still use it, but since its bent, your alignment is probably off. but i dont really know. i luckily got it fixed quickly.

how low is your car? do you have an adjustable camber kit? or a kit at all

[Duatone]

ok strodda, here it is...if your car is pretty low, and i can imagine it is, and since your driving the ever popular 4th gen, and your upper a-arm is hitting due to your camber kit/allignment, heres what you do, i know your gonna hate this, but you have to cut holes over your a-arm in the engine bay so it has room to move, i have checked up on this when i had to do it and i came across 15 4th gens that had to do it, if you dont get it i can put up some pics of mine if you want

[strodda]

Originally posted by Duatone
ok strodda, here it is...if your car is pretty low, and i can imagine it is, and since your driving the ever popular 4th gen, and your upper a-arm is hitting due to your camber kit/allignment, heres what you do, i know your gonna hate this, but you have to cut holes over your a-arm in the engine bay so it has room to move, i have checked up on this when i had to do it and i came across 15 4th gens that had to do it, if you dont get it i can put up some pics of mine if you want

ive had it fixed for a while now, just had the bad spot bent out a little, didnt need to cut a hole.
but im curious, can you post the pics anyways.

[Duatone]

Sure, but i dont have my camera with me, so give me a couple days

[Dezoris]

what kind of upper a-arms do you have/camber kit? Also what kind of drop?

[strodda]

Originally posted by Dezoris
what kind of upper a-arms do you have/camber kit? Also what kind of drop?

not sure if you were asking me or the other guy, but i have an ingalls anchor bolt kit /w poly bushings. as far as a-arms go, i have no clue. maybe you can tell me.


oh yea, and a 2" drop.

[Dezoris]

You can view the attachment.
And tell me if it is the upper a-arm shown in the picture that is causing your problems?

Luckily for Civics and tegs with troubles with a-arms banging the top of the shock tower, there are products available to help curve this problem, simply by design.

I admit that most camber kits are the cause for this issue.

Is the area described in my picture the problem?

[strodda]

yea, exactly. it was hitting the well right where the single arrow is pointing.

[Dezoris]

Thanks for the pic, the best way for me to tell is by removing your wheel or at least jacking up the car so I can see your a-arm better. (upper control arm)

But from the picture I can tell you, that a-arm looks WAY too high!
Like I said in the previous post this is most likely due to the camber kit you have.

There is no quick fix for that.
If you have an accord, it is a real bitch to get right, and there are a lack of quality camber kits avaiable for it. How low are you?

The tegs problem can be solve with 190$ Skunk2 front camber kit


as you can see the end of the arm is angled downward which eliminates the problem the teg has by design.

For the Accords I have yet to find a kit I can confidently say that will solve your problem. Skunk2 does not make one for it.

I am still looking for an answer to help the accord people out so that my only answer is not Raise the car.

[Dezoris]

also in addition, the Accord suspension tuning problems are partly due to the lack of manufactorer support. The accord is more expensive to design for, and the demand is less, for true performance parts. People usually just lower it, and here in the US we don't have a true performance model, so we don't have many choices.

The accord needs a kit like the Skunk2.
I don't like skunks suspension products, but they are the only ones who have solved the "extreme" lowering/rubbing issues by redesigning the end of the a-arms.

Some of my guys at Hondavision are going to be interviewing Skunk2 and talking to them, I hope to find out more details, and hopefully push them to get a kit for the accord.

[strodda]

what about specialty products adjustable ball joint?? is that similar? stock a-arm but like the skunk2's the joint is all that adjusts, keeping the arm in stock position.

...and the arm isnt as high as it looks in the pic. it was just an odd angle i took it at. since i didnt raise the car and it was hard to get the camera in the well

[Dezoris]

That kit you have on now, it moves the arm in and out correct?
how much farther out is it from stock position?

That ball joint may help depending on how far out your arm has been moved out with the ingalls.

But if it is only an inch, I doubt that using an adjustable ball joint would solved the banging problem.

Technically it would reduce the likelyhood, but I cant guarentee it, without knowing how far out that arm is now.

Also, I would use the progress suspension ball joint, because you are guarenteed awesome product support from them, because the are independant, and they have a nice research facility.

You can also call them and talk to someone who will go out of their way to support their product. Specialty is kinda just a cheap knockoff with little support. It works, don't get me wrong, but the support is not there.

[strodda]

it actually wasnt moved that far. less than an inch i believe. but that still created a 2degree correction.