I'm having to replace my upper ball joints on my 89 CRX and I'm curious about 2 things. 1) Are the upper ball joints for my car welded in? and 2) What's a good brand/place to get them? Right now, if I can replace the ball joints instead of the whole UCA, I'm looking at the Moog brand, but seeing as how I may be replacing the UCAs later down the road, I'd rather buy something of good quality but cheaper than the Moogs. The site that I also buy from is down and has no ETA for when they're coming back up, so I'd need a recommended place to buy them from.

Thanks in advance.

 

Yes, the 88-89 uca ball joints are welded in. The 90-91 ones are replaceable....good luck.

 

If you're going to be replacing them, you might as well just replace the whole arm, it will save you some time. I replaced mine with the Moogs, and if I could do it over again I'd just wait and save more to get the OEM arms.

 

Well I'm looking at the Skunk2 UCAs because I might be lowering the car. However, based on member advice, I might be able to sidestep that cost. So I'm looking to replace the ball joints as cheaply as possible. However, if they are welded in, then my choice is easy.

 

theres no clear year when the parts suppliers changed the UCA balljoint from welded to snap ring. its not quite 88, or 89. and considering civics were made in canada and crx's were made in japan, it could be very different between the two.

that being said, just take a look and the difference of being welded and not is pretty obvious.

 

That's just the problem. I'm not currently near the car, but I'm trying to have the parts waiting when I am.

 

Forgot to ask. Any suggestions on where to buy OEM replacements? The site I usually use is modacar.com, but as I said, they're down for the time being.

 

No need for a camber kit unless you're going for that whole herrafrush bullshit. Just have the car aligned after you lower it.

You can try hondaautomotiveparts.com for OEM goodness. I'm sure there are many others. hondapartsunlimited.com too

 

I got someone to look at the car for me and it looks like the ball joints are welded in so I'm looking at replacing the entire uca. I think I'm going to go with the Skunk2 front camber kit since it's only $40 more for a pair than some oem ones I was looking at.

 

Strike that last comment about price. I found the Skunk2 ucas for less than what I was quoted for some OEMs. They're priced at only $187 whereas most other websites don't dip below 219.99. Anyone every heard of autoplicity.com? It's the site I'm thinking of using.

 

The Skunk2 upper control arms are decent parts and fit well. I have them on my 89 sedan and was able to buy them new from a Craigslist ad for $145. After installation, I just had the alignment set to specs and it's been fine ever since. Car is lowered a bit, but rides fine with no oddball camber angles or wheel rub issues.

For the money, the Skunk2 arms are hard to beat, especially since your OEM joints are welded in.

 

or you can go to the junk yard and find some for probably about 20$ for the pair... as stated.. camber kits are not needed

 

Yea... so try to read all the posts before trying to be a d*ck. I clearly said I can get Skunk2 camber kit for LESS than some OEM uca replacement. So even though the camber kit isn't needed... I still save money going with them instead.

I'm not liking this autoplicity place at all. Yea, their stuff is cheap, but I'm coming up on 70 hours after ordering the product and the order status hasn't changed. I've contacted them a couple of times about it and the best I've gotten is that a support ticket has been made and I should hear from someone within 1 business day. I would not recommend this site to anyone expecting a reasonable shipping time.

 

New OEM balljoint and arm and bushings > skunk2

 

Who was being a dick?

 

Keep this thread updated about this situation, I'm about to order the exact same thing from them.

 

Okay, well I'll try to explain my experience with them as best I can. I ordered a Skunk2 camber kit for $187 at 4pm est on Monday February 27th. On Wednesday I hadn't received an email notification that my item was shipped and when I called them about it (because they say they ship within 48 hours) they confirmed that it hadn't been shipped within the 48 hours period. 72 hours later it was the same story. Finally, on Thursday night I received an email with a tracking number and that the item had been shipped via UPS Ground. Using the tracking number on UPS said it was an invalid tracking number. Again I called and was told that the tracking number was for Fedex (I still have the email showing it was UPS ground) and that someone had probably just goofed up. I plugged the tracking number into Fedex and sure enough it had been shipped... on Tuesday. So even though they "confirmed" that my item was not shipped as of Thursday afternoon, it had actually been shipped Tuesday and I received the item yesterday (Saturday) morning.

That being said, I might go with them again if something I want is so cheap. I mean, the Skunk2 camber kit was $187 where everywhere else I looked it wasn't lower than $219.99. I think they just have a really bad problem with organization, processing, and communication throughout their company.

Also, don't exactly believe their ratings on resellerratings.com. Basically, they send you an email after you buy an item asking you to rate them on the website for $5 credited back to the account you paid them from. I haven't written one quite yet, but when I saw 500+ reviews on the website I figured they were reputable and popular based on the sheer number of reviews. However, I find it hard to believe that people give completely truthful reviews when they're paid to do so.

If the price is right and you find something like I did where OEM was more expensive than something like Skunk2, I would definitely suggest giving them a shot. Just be prepared for them to be lagging behind when updating your order status and knowing what has or hasn't been shipped and when.