I appreciate the info because the story was they weren't sure they could get the parts because it's a 20 year old car.

 

dang, are you gonna buy just the inner tie rod or are you going to get another whole rack? Was going to say if you needed outer tie rods i can mail you mine from my old rack.

 

LOL! That's hilarious that they'd say that. We're lucky that our platform has so many parts shared with the Camry/Highlander and others. It's actually surprisingly easy for me to get parts for my 2002 Highlander still. I have a suspension guide for these too that has a lot of part number and bolt sizes for other various hardware

https://www.toyotanation.com/threads...#post-14975586

 

That may depend. I didn't look inside the boots for leaks because I didn't see any signs of leaking, and the donor car showed no signs of damage to I'm surprised it's bent. But I guess I will pull a boot to see if there's signs of leakage. My old ones are probably ok too but more likely not the best since the boots were rotted. It's my own fault for not checking etc before I started. Just me trying to be frugal with one college kid, another headed there this fall and one turning 16. Oldest two have cars nicer and newer than me, but I'm old and cheap.

 

I know that didn't come from the owner... It was a tech who told me over the phone. But the shop is a bunch of SCCA racers, so old is not cool. The owners know their stuff but the techs are young and hip I guess.

 

It is AWD and I added 2 to my cart. Question is should I pick up camber bolts for the strut mount as well to be safe? If so 15mm or 17mm? I figured I'd let them break the toe bolts trying to adjust at the next alignment and say new bolts are in the console 😁. I'm planning on the delphi inner and outer tie rod end and get those replaced this weekend if all goes well.

 

Haha, same here with kids and school fees. hence why i'm trying to ride out my two old cars till they at least get till 1st grade and i can stop paying more than my mortgage worth in daycare and private K expenses

 

I don't think you would need the strut camber bolts unless you wanted to add more than 1 degree of negative camber to your car. I put them up front and at the back of mine to get more negative camber for hard driving, but otherwise they shouldn't be needed. I went with the OEM ones as they are cheaper and stronger than the aftermarket ones (There's a thread about that on Toyota Nation called "OEM Camber Bolts"). To get close to the factory specs, you can loosen both strut bolts and push the knuckle inward to set the camber to slightly negative like the factory recc, the stock rear bolts are not really adjustable though unlike the front.

 

I think I have plenty of negative camber in the rear but I also need to replace trusts there so I'll wait for those. Thanks for all your help in this.

 

Also I forgot to mention that most RXs have the 15mm bolts in the rear, although some Canadian-made 08-09s have 17mm in the back (This is also the standard size for the 2008-2013 Highlander and 2009-2015 Venza). The easiest way to tell is that the 15mm bolts use a 19mm hex on a wrench, and the 17mm bolts use a 22mm hex. I converted my car to the 17mm (2008 Japan model) so I could use the same front bolts in the rear, although they make the factory camber bolts for both sizes too.

 

Parts should be here tomorrow so now the dilemma is if the old rack was aligned in February and in spec thereafter, and the replacement rack was just attempted to be aligned and the left front is in spec but the right is not (bent side) is it better to use the measurements from the old rack entirely, or a combination of the two? As in current measurements for left side and old measurements for the right? That is assuming that all parts are identical in size. It's like a middle school math story problem....

 

February

This week... After looking again I'm not in spec, so... That makes it easier..

 

New inner and outer tie rods installed. Went with the set up on the rack I replaced. Drives decent. Ready for alignment Tuesday. Rear camber bolts on hand for when the alignment shop breaks them trying to do the alignment.😁. Thanks to everyone for the help!

 

I dunno but i feel like i would let the alignment place take care of it. Just get it close to whatever you had....

 

That's the plan now that it's pretty close to what it should be. Alignment was good before the rack change so I used those measurements(#of turns) in the end.