I am looking at a bunch of suspension parts for the Yugo, W123 and Civic on Rockauto. I am sure some of the brands I am seeing are better then others. So which brands do you trust or not? Brands that I am seeing a lot of Dorman, Mevotech, Beck/Arnley, Moog, Raybestos and AC Delco.
I usually buy Moog based on their reputation, or Beck-Arnley though I believe they just put their label on somebody else's parts. However, I'm seeing some extremely inexpensive parts by Mevotech and Deeza - would they be "good enough" for a beater? There's just not a lot of reviews out there on the web for these brands.
Moog stuff is always nice and is usually priced accordingly although I jut bought rear sway bar links for my wife's element for cheap. I jut put a bunch of Mevotech stuff on my 3/4 ton truck. It fits fine. We'll see how it holds up. For the price, a reduced life is OK by me.
Moog, Timken, etc.
In reply to mikeatrpi:
I bought Deeza lower ball joints for my Miata from a local shop. Both went bad after one track day and some Michigan road driving. Replaced with Mazda parts. FYI
Watch the overseas stuff. Sometimes a $30 part will require $120 in shipping!
I wish there were some good reviews for each manufacturer of parts store replacement parts
I bought raybestos thrust arms (some say upper control arms) for the 5 series. I did it because they came without bushings which was the best for me since I had really nice heavy duty rubber bushings ready to go in. Who knows how long the ball joints will last, I'll report back when they fail. Which hopefully won't be for a very long time.
I also bought raybestos brake caliper rebuild kit. I figured it wouldn't be any worse than autozone calipers. The price was right too. All it came with was piston seal, dust boot, and brake bleeder cover.
I'd say no to Mevotech and approach Dorman with caution. They used to have good stuff, but have gone downhill in some areas.
I do not scrimp on suspension parts. It's no fun doing it the first time I definitely don't want to do it a second time. I try to use dealer parts, but if I can't, I go with the best aftermarket, which I assume is Moog. I never use Beck Arnley, because, as has been said, they are just a reseller.
Dont get URO parts. The water pump on my e28 BMW leaked after a short time and now the idler arm bushing is about to go.
SKF seals and bearings are top notch.
The brand names are just marketing. I don't know that you can really find out the actual manufacturer for any part these days. One of my Dorman control arms had a Monroe graphic on it. I got a pair of rotors with a Beck/Arney label on the box that I had bought as Centric Premium rotors. A new URO motor mount split. I haven't had problems with Mevotech parts. Timken seals which were completely the wrong part. I'd say beware of anything you receive.
driver109x wrote: Dont get URO parts. The water pump on my e28 BMW leaked after a short time and now the idler arm bushing is about to go.
I felt that way too after one of their motor mounts ripped apart, but their cooling fan blade and hoses have been fine. I was surprised the other day when the Pelican Parts catalog claimed a URO part to be "GENUINE BMW." Pelican offers several URO parts, but not the motor mounts. It looks like Rock Auto has dropped those URO motor mounts too.
I had really good results with Moog.
How have those Mevotech parts been holdin up? I heard they also have a lifetime warranty now
I've ended up using Mevotech on pretty much everything now. Haven't had an issue out of a single part, the oldest stuff is still living on the MX6 after 4 years.
On the flip side, i did just see a buddy return 3 brand new Moog ball joints in a row due to manufacturing defects. The astonishing thing was that each defect was DIFFERENT.
Just about every OEM suspension/steering part left on my Jeep is now Mevotech as well after this past weekend. Everything fit the way it was supposed to and i didn't notice any glaring "cheesy-ness" to anything.
Gearheadotaku wrote: I'd say no to Mevotech and approach Dorman with caution. They used to have good stuff, but have gone downhill in some areas.
Why no to Mevotech, have you used them before?
Swank Force One wrote: I've ended up using Mevotech on pretty much everything now. Haven't had an issue out of a single part, the oldest stuff is still living on the MX6 after 4 years. On the flip side, i did just see a buddy return 3 brand new Moog ball joints in a row due to manufacturing defects. The astonishing thing was that each defect was DIFFERENT. Just about every OEM suspension/steering part left on my Jeep is now Mevotech as well after this past weekend. Everything fit the way it was supposed to and i didn't notice any glaring "cheesy-ness" to anything.
That's good to know, Mevotech seems to have waaaay better pricing, good to know that the quality is comparable to the expensive stuff
I'm done with Cardone.
I got an axle for the late, lamented E30, and the hub splines were so buggered it was a nightmare with a file and an impact wrench getting the thing together, and I had to re-use my inner sheetmetal grease seal, which didn't work out very well. Similarly, I bunged up the outer boot flange because it took so much coercement to get the thing into the splines.
The Right Answer of course would've been to send it back, but I got confirmation that they just don't provide the inner grease seal plate, and the spline-bunging appeared to just be the normal result of storing their cores in a pile, though I may have gotten a worse-than-normal one... I didn't think my odds of getting better one was worth a week of mailing parts back and forth.
Mevotech lower balljoints for 96-04 pathfinder straight up do not fit. The threaded portion is simply too long and tries to occupy the same space as the front cv shaft. That's on top of the short life span here in Canadian winter road conditions. Also, sway bar end links. They don't have provision to put a wrench on the backside to keep the whole balljoint from spinning and they give you their own "locknuts" which are just normal nuts with damaged threads on the end. The hole in the nuts are often not even drilled on centre so they do like a concentric wobble as you spin them on....
Run_Away wrote: Mevotech lower balljoints for 96-04 pathfinder straight up do not fit. The threaded portion is simply too long and tries to occupy the same space as the front cv shaft. That's on top of the short life span here in Canadian winter road conditions. Also, sway bar end links. They don't have provision to put a wrench on the backside to keep the whole balljoint from spinning and they give you their own "locknuts" which are just normal nuts with damaged threads on the end. The hole in the nuts are often not even drilled on centre so they do like a concentric wobble as you spin them on....
Those are just distorted-thread locknuts. I don't know that they're the right fastener for the job in this case, but it's not "their own" thing. 
I bought AC Delco brake pads for the wife's Trailblazer thinking they were the exact GM part - a little different.
HStockSolo wrote:driver109x wrote: Dont get URO parts. The water pump on my e28 BMW leaked after a short time and now the idler arm bushing is about to go.I felt that way too after one of their motor mounts ripped apart, but their cooling fan blade and hoses have been fine. I was surprised the other day when the Pelican Parts catalog claimed a URO part to be "GENUINE BMW." Pelican offers several URO parts, but not the motor mounts. It looks like Rock Auto has dropped those URO motor mounts too.
I have not noticed that Pelican list some URO parts as OEM, but I did notice that the new URO motor mounts for my 944 pretty obviously had the factory Porsche crest and part number that was cast into the rubber ground off. They're holding up fine.
On the other hand, I just changed a rear shock mount on a friend's E36 last week. It was a URO part I put on about a year ago. I replaced it with a Car Quest part (repackaged Moog, I think) and it was obviously better made when comparing them side by side. Also the URO front strut mounts that I put on my E30 had junk studs in them. They twisted off when the proper torque was applied. I had to knock the old studs out of my original mounts and use them.
AC2 wrote:Gearheadotaku wrote: I'd say no to Mevotech and approach Dorman with caution. They used to have good stuff, but have gone downhill in some areas.Why no to Mevotech, have you used them before?
Good friend of mine is a tech w/20+ years under his belt. Had too many comebacks on Mevotech stuff. Moog? No problem.
HStockSolo wrote: The brand names are just marketing. I don't know that you can really find out the actual manufacturer for any part these days.
This. When I put new head gaskets on my mom's Subaru, I ordered them though Rockauto, and I think they were Fel-pro. When they came, they were in slightly different packaging (same part number) and one of them had the Fuji Heavy Industries (OEM Subaru) logo stamped on the gasket and the other didn't. Weird.
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