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Vanguard
11-22-2006, 12:42 PM
I've had my e34 for a couple of months now and I've said in other posts, she's started to develop a shimmy. Being a Cheap A$$ Bastard (CAB) and not wanting to have to discuss with my wife a $500 bill for parts on a car I just purchased, I decided with some trepidation to order an eBay kit. Rather than the HT FCP Groton package, I went with a seller in LA with a 100% feedback rating.

I ordered them on Monday and they arrived in San Diego, yesterday. This was the same kit that chiefcorey was looking at. After looking the parts over, I was pretty happy with my purchase with the sole exception of one of the upper support arms.

The lower control arms, one of the thrust arms and the end links were Karlyn parts. The parts were individually wrapped in plastic and were packaged in Karlyn boxes with part numbers. The idler arm was HT and was packaged in a sealed plastic bag with HT markings.

The other thrust arm was unbranded and packaged in a heat sealed plastic bag. It's of decidely lower quality than the Karlyn arm. No part numbers are cast into the arm, it has a single ball-joint boot, rather than the 2 piece inner and outer boot on the Karlyn arm and the bushing is clearly inferior. To my amazement the bushing appears to have been tack-welded into the thrust arm. I've already contacted the seller and asked for a replacement arm. I'll let you guys know what their response is.

If you like to see the parts for yourself, I put together a gallery here:

http://www.universal5.com/gallery/main.php/v/e34_Suspension/

632 Regal
11-22-2006, 01:12 PM
god I'm glad I'm all done looking at them things... hope you have better luck than I did, the unbranded ones bushing is softer rubber too IIRC.

31Hertz
11-22-2006, 01:18 PM
Seriously, good luck. When people put these kits together, most of the time they are looking solely for profit; not the best parts. I would rather put two control arms on at a time (or buy a few parts at a time to do later) and know I have good parts than to buy a kit and have questionable ones to show for it.

I sincerely hope it works out well for you.

Vanguard
11-22-2006, 01:29 PM
The unbranded thrust arm won't be going on my car. If I can't send it back, I'll pick up a matching Karlyn thrust arm somewhere else. The quality on the rest of the parts seems good. I don't know if I will use the HT idler or not. Have to see what the current arm looks like when I get underneath the car.