Well just a little update on my aftermarket control arms, after two years and 60,000 miles of driving, my upper driver side control arms are wiped out.

The bushing is torn in one of them and the ball joints are destroyed on BOTH of them. I'm getting all sorts of little clunks from them, especially when braking.

The control arms i used were Beck Arnley and Mevotech.

Personally I'm staying the hell away from anything with the Beck Arnley name on it...don't care what it is, I'll never buy another thing from them. The Beck Arnley wheel bearing I put in only lasted me 7,000 miles. 7,000 miles!! And the control arms lasted 60,000.

Overall I'm still pleased with my aftermarket control arm experience because I saved a boat load of money not going OE, but make no mistake, these cars have horrendous front end suspension designs.

I probably should have added - or at least made clear - that I definitely believe that after market is the way to go with these control arms, simply due to cost. For me to purchase 8 factory control arms for this car would run me somewhere around $1,600 bucks. I'd have to replace after market control arms three times to reach that figure, and like roadfrog said, a lot of these companies offer warranties. I don't think mine had lifetime warranties.

This is what I'm planning/expecting in the future. I'm expecting to have to replace my upper control arms with aftermarket parts every two years. Without a warranty that will cost me around $200 every two years. Not bad. And it's such a quick and easy replacement to do the uppers. I believe the uppers take most of the abuse - I've changed the bottoms and honestly they didn't even need it - but the uppers?? They seem to get pounded because of the geometry of the suspension. They get wiped out very quickly. Even the OE's don't last much longer than 100k.

But this what happens to cars, the only reason why it's a big deal with the LS460 is because if cost. Every car on the road goes through ball joints, tie rod ends, sway bar bushings and links, control arms, struts. This is normal.

Exaclty, I am putting 30,000 miles on my car per year. That's a lot of driving. Not really sure where you're from but where I am driving through the winters around here is like driving on the surface of the moon. Plows create holes so big in the roads that it's not uncommon to blow the tire right off the rim. Picture hitting a 100 of those on the way to work everyday - now some are only an inch or two deep - but when you hit them going 40-50 mph, it takes its toll. Add in the frost heaves, ice, sliding while braking. It stresses the hell out of your front end.

And I'm not replacing all 8 control arms, I'm past that phase of...let's replace everything, I want the car to feel just like new. I'm replacing what is needed, that's it. Upper control arms...maybe two...maybe all four...maybe one...maybe three. Right now I have two that are bad after 60,000 miles of driving.

Absolutely, it's the first thing I'd consider on these cars, followed by sway bushings and links. But the control arms are without a doubt in my mind, the number one cause of front end noise in these cars.

Need all 8 after 1 year...parts are covered from rock auto but I won’t go with Dorman again...

what at would you suggest?

maveotech or Moog...I know your not going with B n A ever...lol

thanks...

What I've found is that no matter what brand you get, you'll be doing them again at some point (if you intend to put another 50,000 miles on the car or so). So what I'd suggest is try to find a company that has a warranty on the parts and maybe buy them at a trusted local parts store, that way you can get the parts warrantied when they break. So instead of the Internet, you can easily return them right to the store (I love buying parts online but in this case it may be worth spending a little more just so you can get that part replaced easily at the store).

With mine I ended up replacing the uppers agin after 50/60k miles or so. Very very easy to do, and parts are readily available (and cheap). The lowers seem to hold up much much better and don't take anywhere near the abuse.

I ended up trading the car in at 178,000 miles...miss that car quite a bit. I still have parts in my garage I've been meaning to put on eBay, lol. I have a right front wheel bearing, ball joints and a right front forward facing upper control arm. The wheel bearing is from BA, warrantied. The arm I bought in a pair (which I didn't need). And the ball joints I bought because I thought I needed them (I didn't). They all are making great paper weights now...probably end up using them as center pieces at my daughter' wedding gen years from now.