LEMFORDER : CHINESE CRAP
 

Hpooey .

I bought a new W123 upper control arm, Pelican says the OEM is N.L.A. but it is, I needed it now and the M-B Classic Center has a price issue they won't fix (SIX TIMES RETAIL PRICE .

Pelican screwed up the will call order yet again by failing to read the comments so no one bothered to call me last week and let me know the order was ready for pickup .

A shame as they really did try to do a good job until fairly recently .

I hope this damned ball joint and dust boot don't crumble into junk like so many other Chinese ball joints doo .

I routinely swap the rubber boots which come on new ball joints and tie-rod ends, since those don't last, and fit a polyurethane boot. I buy the Energy Suspension ones. Shop ebay, or the local Tognotti's has them. I usually have a set for Mopar w/ various sizes.

Yeah, I get these urethane ones on eBay called poly boots. I think they’re Czech? Nice quality. I have a good sized backup pile for tie rods and lower ball joints.

Perhaps there’s a way to rebuild the originals? Nobody does it but I figure they can be pressed in and out of that aluminum arm.

As usual,
 

More great help and I THANK YOU .

Nate, just checked EBay and they are no longer called poly boots. I can find them by searching polyurethane balljoint boots. Made in Bulgaria, got my eastern blocks mixed up.

Better Dust Boots
 

THANX ! .

I'm pretty sure my local O'Reilly's has them in stock as they carry a bunch of Hot Rodder items...

Ooof. Has Lemfoerder quality changed as of late? They are OE on a lot of suspension parts for a lot of euro brands.

Neat to know about the poly boots, thanks!

'OOF' Indeed !
 

I'm going to try it out in any case .

The boots cracked after about 1.5 years but I have had Uro Upper Control Arms on for over 10 years. But I am a low mileage driver.

Yeah, boot swapping also works if you trash a boot on a good joint doing other work and don't want to go through the trouble of swapping the joint too.

You know they build whole entire Mercedes cars in china these days.

Chinese parts don't belong on these cars. Avoid URO and Meyle to stay safe.

Most likely when I need new UCA ball-joints, I'll re-use the arms and press in new ball-joints, as I do in my 1960's cars (screw-in in Mopars). The main reason is that I hate to waste good parts, like the UCA aluminum. But other reasons are that it can save cost and, most importantly, I can control the quality. When you buy a new UCA with bushings and ball-joint, you don't know what parts they installed, but Chinese is a good guess. The UCA sees little force since the spindle gives it a long lever arm. All I've had to do on my 1985 300D (now at 380K miles) is replace the rubber bushings on the sway bar connection since they fell apart to cause a rattle. That is fairly easy as no pressing is required (tapered rubber). I recall having to unbolt the UCA pivot to swing it out. I did have to replace the lower ball joints (recall, might have been just my 1984 300D).

For the complete front end rebuild I successfully did on my 1985 300D a few years ago, I had suspicions that of all the parts needed (and there were many), the possibility of some Chinese product (that I could easily identify) finding its way into the mix was reasonable. The strategy I adopted to try to prevent any Chinese product from getting onto the car:
1. Acquire parts from brands that I had reason to reasonably believe wouldn't be made in China or include Chinese components (this is not a completely failsafe solution).
2. Collect and closely inspect all of the parts before I started on the job.
The result: I found one instance (don't recall what it was) of a Made in China part. No, I couldn't detect something that had no place of origin on it but so far as I know, I caught the one culprit.

So far, so good with the parts installed.

Ball Joints
 

FWIW ;

I've had to do two front end rebuilds, when I do the job I do it all ~ trailing arm bushings and sway bar bushings etc., etc...

This car, my 1982 240D wore out the upper ball joints to the point they began to rattle .

I *thought* both upper control arms were replaced when the left upper ball joint began banging away some years ago .

This new Chinese part came with the sway bar end bushings .

I have a box full of N.O.S. German, original Mercedes lower ball joints I bought some years ago, as soon as I figure out where I stored it I'll get started .

I should sell off the extra lower ball joints .

As always, I greatly appreciate the help and ideas given .