Hi everyone. I am new to the forum so sorry if my question seems stupid.

I have a 2004 ES330 and a while ago I hit a curb at 10-15MPH on a sharp unmarked corner at night. I took it into the mechanic and he said that the lower control arm was bent and the lower ball joint was broken. He quoted $2,000 to fix both of these because it would take 15 hours of labor. This seems very high to me. I have done some research and found that the new factory parts are about $600 so $1,400 in labor seems outrageous. Any thoughts on what to do or if this price seems fair?

 

Any thoughts about posting this in the ES forum instead of the SC?

https://www.clublexus.com/forums/es300-and-es330-179/

 

I did not see that. I thought this was for suspension and brakes in general

 

Seems outrageous to me. You can get a new control arm from rockauto for less that $80. The item picture show the ball joint. It might even be included with the control arm. I replaced both the control arms myself on my 95 Camry V6, similar to an ES300. I don't see $1400 in labor to do replace them unless there is more damage that you have not identified.

 

It's outrageous if that's all that's needed.

A Moog combination control arm with ball joint is under $100 per side for the part, probably 2 hours of labor to replace, plus an alignment. It should be less than $400 out the door.

 

I looked and the repair manual and it says that you have to take the engine and transmission out of the car to replace the control arm. How could that be?

 

What?

what repair manual are you looking at???

I'll look tomorrow at work, but I couldn't imagine labor being more than an hour and a half or two...

I've done some crazy hard control arms, but none have ever required removal of anything more in depth than an axle... even in the weird case a bolt was hard to get to, complete removal of the engine would never be required, perhaps loosening of the mounts and lifting it enough to get it out of the way...

 

Shouldn't your insurance cover this?

 

even at an independent shop, I can't imagine this complete repair costing more than $350ish... even if he only has a $100, or even no deductible, it is still worth it to pay for it out of pocket, as insurance will cover that under the collision portion, which can affect monthly rates over a 5 year or more period...

 

I dont know why I was told that the engine and transmission had to be removed. Its what the mechanic told me when I was at the shop and its what he showed me in the repair manual

 

well, got a chance to look at the repair manual... The control arm bolts are situated in such a way that removal of at least the subframe/engine cradle is required... The book does lisst on 04-06 models complete engine removal... On all others from 01 on, it just lists cradle removal... Also, as a side note, that same year Camry with the 3.3, it justs lists the cradle removal... That labor time ranges from 7.8 to 8.5...

The easy way to do it would be to support the engine using a cross brace from above, then remove the cradle...

This is officially the hardest control arm I've ever heard of to replace...

 

^^ Look at Audi procedures if you ever get the chance... When changing the 14 control arms in the front, at 250$/pop on top of labour.

Oh. and OP, get a new Mechanic. It might be a **** to do, but not removing motor hard.

Like above, he'll lift up the motor if anything, a good mech. can make do with experience. If Toyota calls for engine removal for control arms... damn they should be removing the transmission to do the timing belt! hahaha

 

Holy crap man, thats insane. Any chance your around the Richmond area? I know a good mechanic there.

 

FYI, I just had a talk right one of the CL memebers I 'm friends with tho has an '03 ES300 and is a Toyota Tech as well, He said while YES, the repair manual calls for pulling the engine, he can change the control arm in around 2 hours. Add just a tad more for the ball joint.

 

I got it fixed yesterday and it was $1300, $850 for labor and $450 for parts...