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Pass steering knuckle

Kaseyzgrandprix

Kaseyzgrandprix

New member
Wait a min wait a min, Walmart sells steering knuckles? Wtf? And the same knuckle that's at least 50+bucks less with the same Dorman part number? Just doesn't seem right to me,


Hello all and thanks for your time in advance!!!

First off I'm not placing blame on anyone, let's get that part out of the way cause my wife may just read this haha. So wed my wife drove the grandprix to work, on her way home I was on the phone with her talking about supper and she hit a pothole so hard I heard the dash shake violently. I said babe are you ok? Get off the phone and drive already "jokingly" I put a Bluetooth deck in so we could (legaly) chat while driving. She arrived home and I looked in the car to find a vent on the ground, meaning she REALLY took that hole on. I drove it around the next day probably put 80-90 miles on it before the passenger steering knuckle broke while I was going 50 on a crowded street. It veered into oncoming tragic I hit the park brake trying to pitch the car it started rotating I depressed again to take off the park brake and stood on the gas. Not a scratch on my car or anyone else's. But I Def had to change my drawers afterword... I've owned mustangs 350z and a few other cars that I learned to drift in so I am OK at controlling a car but with the adrenaline and panic I thought I was a upright corps, I'm pretty sure I couldn't do that twice and THANKGOD I was alone had no kids or wifey in the car. Just believe me when I say it was about as close to death as I have yet to come in my 35 yrs here... so my question... I am HELL BENT on replacing driver and passenger side knuckles tie rod ends (even though they aren't bent) like pretty much everything I can afford to replace. When I'm done the suspension will be new but beside the knuckles what's the best place to go next? In other words what do you fine folks think will fail and try to kill me next? haha I ALWAYS rain snow or shine do the work myself for its hard for me to trust the lives of my most precious cargo to someone I don't know let alone someone who sees my car as number 6 of the day... nah not this guy. Weekend warrior baby yeah. Thanks for ANY input and if you don't have nothing nice to say go start another thread ..;)


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Yeah abrupt is a subtle word for it. I was driving down a straight smooth road when it broke, like I said I'm glad it broke on me and no one else. So after the knuckle, hub, and? I have in my head what seems to be a good plan but I value opinions and input in such things. You can't learn anything if your to stubborn to listen to someone else's opinion. So let's here it folks

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Nothing else is really going to go bad and cause something like this.

So besides the knuckle and tie rod ends the only other thing to look at is the ball joint and control arm bushings. Depending on miles, they should be change around 100k as the control arm bushing will be pretty worn. Just buy a whole new arm, they only cost 40-50 bucks for a dorman or MOOG part.
 
I would visually inspect everything of course. Check sway bar and links. My sway bar is bent, is hard to tell if your not looking for it, but mine is bent and starting to touch one of my axle boots. (Chicago potholes)


I would really inspect the strut and control arms as well.
 
I have VERY thoroughly checked all I can get to and while replacing the knuckle on pass side where the incident occurred I was very thorough but some stuff the eye can't see and the car was bought used so beside me being anal about even the smallest Crack or fissure I feel compelled to replace everything the tire COULD have contacted whilst flipping around in the well even though the only scratch I see is on the strut, and it is so small it may not have come from the broken knuckle. The ball joint DEF got trashed but ya know I'll bet I could have still used it if I weren't such a freak about weird sh*t I'm thinking all else I need to replace is what fivefinger spoke of. Eventually within the next year the suspension will be mostly hotchkis from the 89009 kit
I go to the track now and then but on an empty road I drive much faster than I should (says the law anyway :-\ ) so I depend on solid parts keeping my idiotic mind on my shoulders where it goes. Thanks guys I feel better and somewhat relieved confirming options with others. And again thanks for your time. Have a great night and weekend

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ive seen enough broken alum knuckles that we went straight to the steel dormans (beefier than the steel 9c1)

the way the corrosion pits and expands within a cavity just leaves too many fracture prone points near the edges of a relatively thin alum die casting.

one of the worst areas for corrosion is between the strut ears and the upper knuckle.

basically put...there's a reason that GM put the steel knuckles on the HD 9c1/taxi packages

it took a while before i found nice clean alum knuckles off an 02 that evidently got split outer cv boots early in its life from someone prying on the lower ball joint stud....if id hazard a guess.

on the other side of the coin... you may just have had a weak knuckle, the number of broken knuckles ive seen is well below a 1per 1k failure rate by a large margin, go to the junkyard and find an cleanish W/G/H body and take the knuckle and you'll likely be fine.
 
I know this thread is neatly wrapped up and don't intend to hijack it, but...

Turbocharged400sbc said:
ive seen enough broken alum knuckles that we went straight to the steel dormans (beefier than the steel 9c1)
Click to expand...

Steel knuckles? Did not know about those and must investigate. Just fronts? Any fit differences?

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just the fronts, i have 4 fronts to sell from the old 442 suspension setup now that we are doing billet knuckles
dorman makes em, one part number can be seen at the middle bottom
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Ah. Thanks! Those are cast iron, but have to be much better when it comes to impact.

Gratuitous late model Ram carnage on a cast alum control arm:

 
they have too much carbon to be iron.
sparks from em are far brighter, more like steel grinding than iron. made in china so it could be made from the meltings of an 88 grand prix rustbucket
 


Well, I should say Summit calls them cast iron. Dorman does not specify iron. Obviously your understanding of metallurgy surpasses mine so I'll take your word for it. I'd speculate that its probably the same (or close) metal that spindles have been made from since always. How's the weight difference?
 
rockauto lists them as cast iron per dorman. Dorman is advertising them as an upgrade to the aluminum OEM's and are supposedly "crack resistant" lol
 
And they're any where from 200 to 300... I went to the junkyard and got a clean one for 35 bucks, but I am saving for the supposedly upgraded one. It will be back running tomorrow I had to replace the tie rod, strut, lower control arm, bushings ect today. Not cheap, I hope Dorman really did upgrade them. That was a scary situation swerving into oncoming traffic made me want to replace everything

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Did you replace the struts in pairs or just one?

That can throw the car outta whack sometimes, it might sit higher on that side because the spring is newer. I mean you have to get an alignment anyway, but just something to note.
 
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Just the one strut same spring, I changed them both about 3 months ago, and it will Def go for alignment . I appreciate the input for sure. Good lookin out

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Yea well Dorman had a massive recall on their steel knuckles breaking so I'd be cautious of grabbing steel ones from a junkyard. I did see a impala cop car yesterday in the junk yard and the knuckles looked like aluminum. Got the rear sway out tho cause the whole front end was smashed in lol.

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That was almost what mine looked like. It was WAY to close. The Dorman Steering Knuckle 697-910 is said to be cast iron. I think summit has em for 80 or 90 bucks which whoops the hell outa local places that are asking almost 300. I'm going for an alignment tomorrow, I'm happy with everything I bought but the knuckle. It was cheap, clean, and will hopefully hold together for a few day haha.



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HighOctaneRacing said:
Yea well Dorman had a massive recall on their steel knuckles breaking so I'd be cautious of grabbing steel ones from a junkyard. I did see a impala cop car yesterday in the junk yard and the knuckles looked like aluminum. Got the rear sway out tho cause the whole front end was smashed in lol.

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Click to expand...

it was their aluminum replacement knuckles that were defective, no recall or issues exist with the dorman steel/iron knuckles.

our iron blocks and an iron ford bracket from 64 both have dull red sparks, the knuckles came a lot closer to the bright yellow sparks of a piece of steel.

they may say iron but its def high carbon content ****
 
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