I made a mistake by installing JBA UCA’s. Yes, the pipes are OK but ball joints are absolute garbage.
I very rarely had any problems with Moog products and they come with a lifetime warranty on most parts lines… An OEM part at best most of the time only has a 1 year warranty, and you are replacing the OEM part cause it wore out… Now Napas better line and Advances top CQ lines are pretty good also, but the cheaper parts line and most AZ stuff is not worth the box they came in…
That is my take on years of dealing with nation wide shop warranty’s…
1 Like
It depends. If you are talking about some gm, you are 100% correct - AM is A LOT cheaper and AT LEAST as good (or bad?) as OEM. With Toyota, it’s different - regardless of warranty, OEM lasts A LOT longer but is way more expensive. My take (with Toyota) is to install OEM if it’s 1. safety related or may let you stranded or 2. replacement requires significant amount of work.
When it comes to gm (yes, guilty as charged - I do own a Duramax GMC for heavy duty household stuff like firewood), it’s aftermarket all the way simply because OEM is obscenely overpriced junk. For example, two OEM duramax thermostats run well over $100 while reputable AM - $60-70. Which also is excessive. I recently replaced a t-stat (nothing was wrong with it but after 20+ years/280,000 mi I thought it was a good idea) on my 2004 4Runner for $30. OEM with (!!!) housing.
I’m a huge Toyota brand supporter, but they have had a lot of sway bar end links, control arm bushings and struts/strut mount issues…
Napa’s Premium Grade works good as well as Altrom line for Toyota’s…
You are right. People will buy ANYTHING at some of the yard sales around here including crap that should be in the trash! Sometimes they even get more than NEW price for this junk. I had just bought the basic $20 torque wrench at Harbor Freight once. My girlfriend likes those flea markets and we were at one not long after. There was a seriously beatup one of the EXACT tool I had just bought for $25. I laughed and told my girlfriend that there was no way I would pay more than new price for one that looked like it had been driven over by a truck.
There was a guy nearby who I thought was just shopping. It turned out it was the person who ran that booth. He was like “Well, there isn’t a Harbor Freight in this town and it would cost more to drive to one and buy it new than to buy mine.” I told him I wasn’t from there and basically drive by Harbor Freight almost each and every day including that day so that didn’t apply to me.
I sure wouldn’t buy a used/refurbished control arm off the internet. Even the new stuff is questionable unless you are sure you are on a legit site and not just some scam counterfeit version of a name brand product.
I once asked if there was any reason to keep a dry rotted compact spare for the rim. Basically everyone here said NO unless you just wanted to hoard it. They also said to damage the tire so it couldn’t be reused by some cheapskate, creating a dangerous situation. I put an electric drill through the sidewall in a couple places and off it went in my next load of scrap. I didn’t know if there was any reason to keep it or not so figured I would ask. This question might be along the same lines.
Also, the possible re-use for welding projects is not a bad idea if the owner has any use for that. Otherwise it is just junk that should be properly recycled. There are some metal parts I will keep for this purpose. Sheet aluminum and old license plates can be useful for patching aluminum boats and canoes so keeping some of that around isn’t a bad idea if you are into boating. Stainless steel sheet stock is EXPENSIVE and sometimes can be salvaged from appliances, grills, etc. I burn wood and the baffles that came in my wood stove are ceramic. The bars that hold them have warped so the $150 baffles were breaking under their own weight because they were not evenly supported. I cut some stainless gas grill doors down to the proper size and placed the remaining insulation on top of them. This seems to work just as well as the factory baffles but I am sure I am losing a tiny bit of efficiency although it is nice not to be replacing these things all the time.
Sheet metal from appliances, computer casings, etc. can be useful as well. I keep just a little of that around as I have several kayaks. One has a spot that wears through. I have made a form of sorts the shape of the kayak hull where it wears through so I can support the hull and keep it from deforming when heating to conduct plastic welds to patch the hole. I have one piece of metal formed just to the right shape that I have kept and another flat piece to form for this purpose if needed.
The stainless steel hardware on kayaks and boats is quite expensive. Buying just one bolt is several dollars. The same hardware is used in some of the higher end gas grills. I pulled one apart to help my dad get rid of it and realized the hardware was the same as on the kayaks. I have a small sandwich bag filled with that hardware which is probably enough for a lifetime so I am not in a hurry to collect more of that.
While most worn out parts are likely junk, there are potential re-uses as mentioned, even if not for automotive uses.