SPC control arms

And since I don’t have the latest redesign I can expect these to die based on posts, almost assuredly after the 3 year shop warranty expires.

 

No ya those are good points.

 

I think that’s the magic sauce…figuring out how to correctly design and manufacture ball joints that don’t require greasing. Time will tell if SPC can get it right.

For sure it’s possible to make “maintainance-free” ball joints, judging from my stock UCA ball joints that have a fair amount of off-road use on a 2.5 in lift. The ball joints are getting more abuse just due to the lift, and they’re still good after 85k miles. Good enough for me! I even bought an extra set of stock take-off UCA’s for when for when it’s time to replace them. If you have the wheel/tire clearances that allows stock UCAs to be used, and don’t mind the caster to be slightly out of spec after lifting, they’re a very good option!

 

Hindsight I sure wish I would have stuck at 2" front lift and the factory UCA's. Should these SPC's go south, I'm most likely going back to factory and a smaller front lift.

 

2020 ORP with Bilstein 6112 up front with 2" lift. Bought SPC UCA's in 2021 when lift was done and they failed after 20K miles. Called and they replaced them under Warranty and sent new ball joints (kind with grease fitting), this was in 2023. They failed again after 1 year. They again warrantied them and sent me the "new, improved" design with sealed joint, no grease fitting. I had them installed in March this year and just took to shop as I was hearing clunking and sure enough - they are shot! So got only 6 months out of them. Again, no hard off roading, just some gravel roads. Very dissapointed. Not sure if they are just bad product or maybe my mechanic is doing something wrong installing them? Wondering if I should even bother calling them AGAIN? Maybe 3rd time is the charm... looks like they changed their design yet again. Or just cut my losses and go with another more reliable brand. What brands would most folks recommend as far as reliability? Thanks!!

 

I would try JBA if I were you. I was going to try them on the taco just because of the color.... when I was about to order they were out of stock for sometime, and this and the other....and so ended up I ordering SPC again! and went to town with special paint and got them red hot and everyone thinks these are JBA, but they are just SPC . Give JBA a try.

 

Thanks.. looks like the consensus is JBA or Dobinsons

 

I’m currently a test case for the actual new design. Had two or three set fail prematurely. Check if your SPC’s match the description below or not. If you have all silver metal parts, they’ll fail 100%. I have a 5000 mile suspension shop inspection on Saturday to check for play again.

 

Skip all the spc drama(couldnt get it right before so why would they now).

Tons of other options. Jba, apache, dobinsons, hell id even try freedom offroad before spc.

 

Didn’t Spc get it right for years before these other brands existed

 

That’s a good question. Did they? I’ve only been around the forum since 2021, and always recall them being failure prone. Maybe they make good UCAs for other cars, but for some reason they struggle with 4runners/tacomas?