Uniball LBJ conversion

Just stumbled on these from Total Chaos. Conversion for 2000-2003 already available. Apparently 2004-2006 coming soon. $1k feels a bit steep. Anyone considering them?

https://www.instagram.com/p/CqtjkH7vjZ3/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

 

I'm not considering them, I'm getting them when they come out 04-06 DC

 

Aside from reliability I wonder what the pros are.

 

I assume more movement, and maybe safer?

 

The Toyota lower ball joint design on the 1st Gen Tacoma and 3rd Gen 4Runner is known to be a weak link. To explain the design in the simplest way, imagine your car trailer ball off your hitch facing the ground, and the tongue of your trailer hitch facing up. Every time you hit a bump on the road, the ball would be tugging itself out of the trailer hitch cup.

The ball joint design is best described this way, and with the way the lower control arm bolts to the spindle, forces are being applied in a direction that can contribute to premature parts failure.

When your suspension droops with an aftermarket extended shock, long travel system or spacer kit the lower ball joint and outer tie rod are placed at a near binding angle and stressed under load. Over time this added angle causes additional wear on the lower ball and socket configuration. These pressed-in assembled parts are prone to separate and cause catastrophic failure to the steering and suspension system.

For the last 2 years our R&D team dedicated design time and logged 35,000 test miles to launch the first fully bolt-on billet machined 1" lower uniball conversion. We drove on these parts for 18 months to prove the parts were ready to send to production.

This R&D process was a true test of patience, refining each prototype to include additional features and more benefits. We now offer the most durable lower uniball conversion with added safety and component strength in mind. Constant innovation. Our minds are always racing!

CNC machined AISI 1018 billet steel construction.

Lower uniball conversion is designed to upgrade the factory ball joint with added strength and durability.

Built in locating pins and registering center ring lock into the spindle and lessen the shear load on the mounting hardware.

Designed to reduce bump steer and improve steering geometry.

100% bolt on and fully rebuildable.

Lower control arm tapered adapters are included. Bolts to stock Toyota LCA's or TC long travel kits.

Re-uses factory outer tie rod ends.

Black Cerakote coating to maximize corrosion resistance.

Mounting hardware is included.

Not intended to be installed with other manufacturers' aftermarket suspension systems.

 

Hahahah at first I was like damn, he did some research

 

I wonder what this means, exactly? Is this just a lawyer's disclaimer because they didn't test the uniballs with other suspension systems or should these really not be used with other company's suspension systems? Asking as a guy with an RCD lift.

 

Yeah would like some explanation of this. Like it only works with OEM front suspension or what?

 

I wonder as well. Have to look into that. It bolts to the spindle, LCA, tie rod. If it fits stock aftermarket that bolts in should all work I would think.

 

That's just CYA speak.

 

Exactly. They can't possibly test it with every variation, CYA just in case someone uses it with something other than what they've specifically declared.

 

For some reason, I'm more open to spending $1k on these than the Solo LCA's. Still a lot of monies though. $1,000 would get me a new high clearance rear bumper.

 

I'm not an engineer, so if someone could educate me on the merits of this I'd be happy to admit I'm wrong... but I don't see how it's an improvement.
1) The weakness in the OEM part is in the ball joint. So these guys replace the ball joint with a Heim joint, which is inherently weaker and not designed to take that type of load.
2) The Heim joint is completely exposed to the elements on the bottom -- unlike a ball joint that's protected by the rubber boot. I would think the Total Chaos part wouldn't last very long in climates that treat roads with salt.

 

It costs a thousand dollars, it’s obviously five times better than the OEM one.

 

Google told me...

The uniball design is better for heavy-duty off-roading because of its more durable design. However, daily driving with uniball control arms is risky because they don't have the sealed design of a ball joint; daily debris on the road can damage uniball performance quickly.

 

I wonder if any of the Icon Delta joints are compatible with this.

 

Wouldn't we see even MORE debris when driving off-road? I've seen the crazy dust you have out west. Here we have mud.

Seems like even a few instances of winter salt and brine could kill these too.

 

I don't think you want them unless you bash hard on your truck. My TC uniballs up top are clean as new after a couple of years, but they are way more protected than LBJ. But those conversions are also rebuildable. If the come out for my truck I'm getting them. I wonder how to lube them?, spray super lube from the bottom perhaps or maybe there is top access for a straw.

 

But the foundation for this "upgrade" is based on the use of a Heim joint in leu of a ball joint, which is crazy for this application.

As I said I'm not an engineer, but I feel like I have a pretty good layman's understanding of basic mechanics and physics. All you have to do is look at a ball joint next to a Heim joint to see the merits of each:
Heim joint - stronger with radial loads (side to side), weaker at axial loads (up and down)
Ball joint - weaker with radial loads (side to side), stronger at axial loads (up and down)

The problem being that the dominant loading of this part of our suspension is axial, not radial. A good application for a Heim joint would be in a tie rod end, where the load is radial.

Again, I'm not an engineer so I had to Google it to see if my hunch about this was correct.

These guys sell Heim joints and say this:
"Being weaker than ball joints, Heim joints can’t take the hard hits from the rough patches. Moreover, Heim's joints require a lot more attention, they need to be cleaned now and then, especially after a race or off-road weekends. Using WD-40 to clean them after the track time will improve the lives of these joints, or else you will have to pay the price as it will attract corrosion on the threads or welds."
"Though Heim joints can offer additional angular movement, they don’t last long as they are not designed to withstand impacts. But because of the additional angular movement it offers, it is still a popular choice among enthusiasts."

In this thread on JeepForum.com they're talking about the pros and cons of Heim vs ball joints in a steering system, but the reasoning is transferable to suspension.
This one post pretty wells sums it up:
"I've played with a lot of heim joints on open-wheel race cars and made a few heim-jointed parts for street cars. Based on that, I don't think heims have any place on a street-driven vehicle.

Cons:

• There is no method to accommodate wear. Slight wear will result in slack in the joint. Slack in the joint equals rattling when unloaded and play when loaded.
• There is no way to seal the joint from water, grit, dirt, sand, etc - see above for consequences of wear.
• They are very expensive to replace.
• They lose strength exponentially with misalignment.

An automotive TRE from a reputable manufacturer will last 4-5 times as long as a heim joint will for 1/2 the price.

Heims are cool I guess, you can make anything work with them for better or worse, but I think bushings and TREs more useful for a street car. And where a flex joint is needed, something rebuildable and preload adjustable would be better, like a Johhny Joint."

I don't know, to me it doesn't seem like much of an upgrade unless you need more articulation because you're running long travel suspension for the Baha 500.

 

Still better than a set of moog LBJ's falling apart.

 

Everything has its place. If you have long travel set up and you’re truly pushing the limits of your truck often I.e. high speeds in the desert or the most difficult of off-road trails then sure what’s another $1k for an already extremely expensive front end build. For the every day driver, weekend warrior, person that hits trails but still has 33’s. These aren’t really necessary imo. I also have enough maintenance to do, I don’t want to be keep tabs on upper or lower uniballs to make sure they don’t start squeaking or prematurely wear out. I’ll stick with tied n true OEM.

 

Hey guys, my name is Mike, I've worked at Total Chaos for 18 years. I spent over 2 years developing this part at TC. I came across this thread and figured it'd be appreciated if I chimed in with a little bit of info and some back story on why we decided to make the part, why its designed the way it is, and answer any other questions you guys (and possibly gals) may have.

I started messing with the idea Just after my son (who is almost 4 years old) was born. I have a 2000 Tacoma 4x4 and after seeing quite a few ball joints fail I decided that I wasn't going to have that be a possibility with my new son in the car.

In my 18 years of working in the off-road industry I’ve only seen 1 uniball catastrophically fail. It was a poor quality uniball that eventually came out of the race. The Uniball was cheap ($15-$30) and was raced in Mexico throughout 2 seasons on a class 7 truck. The owner will not It be named but in my opinion that’s what you get when you don’t prep race cars.

I have seen countless first gen ball joints fail. The OEM ball joints are pretty damn good and very strong. The problem is when people don’t check their vehicles out and let them get sloppy.

There is no arguing that it’s a bad design on Toyotas part, it was a design carried over from the 86-95 truck. That truck didn't have issues because the load was on the upper ball joint because that’s where the torsion bar put the load. When they went to the Tacoma they changed from a torsion on the upper to a coil-over on the lower arm and kept the same lower ball joint design additionally they added a steering arm to it which only multiplied the load. The bottom line is the design is what it is. In my opinion, the first gen Tacoma (and tundra) is the last good frame truck Toyota made in for the US market so TC decided to make a stronger option for the customer who wants to off-road their truck and have piece of mind that it’s not going to come apart.

The uniball conversion isn’t for everyone and TC never claimed it would out last an OEM ball joint, they claimed it’s stronger than an OEM ball joint, and I stand by that. It's simply a different option for the Tacoma/4-Runner/Tundra owners out there who want piece of mind and the strongest option out there.

The ball joints that fail do so for a multitude of reasons. I have seen the ball come out of the race on a Tacoma ball joint but if you have let your joint get that sloppy without noticing that’s kind of on you. Mostly it’s the ball stud breaking. With the uniball design the whole thing is held together with a 5/8”-18 12point grade 8 bolt. I’ve never seen a bolt of this size in an application like this shear off like the ball studs do on Tacoma ball joints. Is it possible for the ball to come out of the race? Yes I guess everything is technically possible. But if you let your joint go far enough to where the ball comes out of the race then you got what was coming to you for not maintaining your vehicle.

Ball joints are sealed top and bottom and pumped full of grease which keeps moisture out of the joint. But what happens if you fully seal a uniball is condensation builds up inside the boot/cover and begins to corrode because there isn't any grease to protect against the moisture. I have photos of different companies arms with uniball covers that are destroyed under the cap with corrosion. In addition to fully sealed, if you only seal one side the moisture will come up from the bottom through the liner and corrode the sealed side.

In regards to strength and axial/radial loads I don't have the load ratings on the factory joint compared to a 1" spherical bearing, but I do have the spherical bearing load ratings and with the following numbers, I'm not worried about the bearings coming apart. Static radial limit load: 104,000lb Static axial limit load: 19,300lb Dynamic oscillating load: 56,250lb. In addition to that the snap-ring is rated at 25,000lb. These load limits also are rated at perfect 90° angles. They do not take different situations into consideration like misalignment. If the ball is misaligned at all, the axial load limit has now been increased because its not being forced 100% out of the race anymore, its now also loading the outer race into the side of the bearing housing. I agree that the ball joint may have a slightly higher load limit than the spherical bearing IF it were loaded in the correct orientation, but in this application the ball is constantly being pulled out of the socket, not into the socket which is where it would possibly be stronger. It also has to be mentioned that although a ball joint may have more percentage of the ball held with a liner, you have to take into consideration the size of the ball. A 1" spherical bearing is significantly larger than the stock ball joint and only rides on plastic lining that is far more prone to breaking than a woven liner.

Another area that I have seen issues is how the housing mounts to the spindle. in stock form there are 2 dowels that align and help take shear load off the 10mm (or 12mm depending on what year) bolts. I have seen people have the dowels fall out and unknowingly not use dowels in their ball joints and have the bolts shear. The Total Chaos unit has them machined in so they cant be forgotten. In addition to those dowels we have machined a ring on top of the housing that registers into the bottom of the stock spindle. Although this doesn't help with turning load on the bolts since its on centerline with the Kingpin inclination, it does help take shear load off all of the hardware.

Please let me know if you guys want to know anything that I didn't answer here. I'm not here to argue or challenge anyone, I just thought I'd shed some light on the topic. I'm going to be buying a 2003 Tundra within the next month and I'm really looking forward to enjoying the hell out of it!

 

Thanks for chiming in and it's great to have you on here!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

I also forgot to mention that the version for the 04-06 Tundra is in the works. We wanted to make sure the first version was 100% complete and worked with every vehicle and tie rod variation.

Toyota brain fart / fun fact of the day: The Tundra and 4-runner share the same exact lower ball joint/steering arm; they are literally the same and share the same Toyota Part number, one would fit on the other just fine. That being said the 4-runner and Tundra have completely different different outer tie rods and will not swap with each other. Also the Tacoma has a the largest outer tie rod of the three models.

 

Thanks for adding facts and real world experience to the conversation. As I said I'm not an engineer or fabricator... just giving my layman's observations.

 

Mike, Thanks for this info! I've got an 05 DC its my offroad/hunting truck and I drive it like I stole it so it sees some hard miles. I was just out over the weekend and had a stock lower ball joint fail on me and about had me stranded in the middle of nowhere. Long story, but it showed signs of failing but I had neglected it thinking it was a different issue. Anyways, It's been discussed in this form and you see it all over but people say that uniball is pretty susceptible to the elements, dirt, salt, rocks, etc.. since its exposed. How much abuse can these joints really take and what is the best way to maintain them? Thanks!

 

So to be frank, If its in extreme elements no it will not last as long as a OEM ball joint with basic usage. That being said, once the abuse starts coming into play then the overall strength starts becoming a factor. Basically if you're religious about changing the OE ball joints every couple years you'll be fine. The whole reason I went down the path of designing these is because #1 I'[m stubborn and was told it wasn't achievable and #2 the more or less inability for the joint to separate like the ball joint does. I say more or less because anything is possible with enough neglect and abuse.

 

Doesn't look like a heim joint to me. Looks like a uniball. Pretty sure that's what it's called.

 

Ok so you're saying they aren't really any less durable than an OE ball joint? I was under the impression that they were supposed to be changed out almost yearly, which I guess it depends on how you drive and where you drive. Do you have a ballpark ETA on when TC will have them ready for the 05-06 tundras? Thanks again!

 

I would love a ballpark eta as well. As far as durability, they are stronger. As far as longevity, most performance parts require more maintenance than OEM parts. But like you said, it depends on how and where you drive.