UMI front suspension kit CLUNKING!

[snakedew]

Hello everyone, before I rant about my bad financial decisions I would like to introduce my car. I have a 1981 gmc caballero with a 305/th350 combo.

I recently installed a UMI front suspension kit for my g-body, specifically the corner max kit that comes with the 3056 adjustable upper control arms. I installed the UMI kit myself and torqued everything to correct spec and greased all my ball joints, but to my surprise, it had a clunk coming from the upper control arms.
I ended up tracking down the clunk to be coming from the joints that hold the control arm onto the crossbrace. I have tightened the bolts, sprayed silicone grease on the joints, and it seems no matter what I do the arms still clunk incessantly! I am genuinely stumped with this issue and would appreciate help please!

 

[Cauterize]

Hello everyone, before I rant about my bad financial decisions I would like to introduce my car. I have a 1981 gmc caballero with a 305/th350 combo.

I recently installed a UMI front suspension kit for my g-body, specifically the corner max kit that comes with the 3056 adjustable upper control arms. I installed the UMI kit myself and torqued everything to correct spec and greased all my ball joints, but to my surprise, it had a clunk coming from the upper control arms.
I ended up tracking down the clunk to be coming from the joints that hold the control arm onto the crossbrace. I have tightened the bolts, sprayed silicone grease on the joints, and it seems no matter what I do the arms still clunk incessantly! I am genuinely stumped with this issue and would appreciate help please!

Have you reached out to UMI? They are quite active in the form here and always seem to try and reach out to people having issues.
UMI Sales

 

[snakedew]

I plan on doing that tomorrow when then open back up. Ive heard great things about how helpful they are.

 

[melloelky]

welcome to the site.

 

[Built6spdMCSS]

Check the spacing where the joints bolt into the brackets. I had a short bushing on one, put in a washer and it fixed it.

 

[snakedew]

Check the spacing where the joints bolt into the brackets. I had a short bushing on one, put in a washer and it fixed it.

Noted. And you mean put a washer on the outside bolts correct?

 

[Built6spdMCSS]

Noted. And you mean put a washer on the outside bolts correct?

No, washer closed up the gap where the short Bushing was.

 

[UMI Sales]

Hmm, 3056 should be dead quiet. Send me some pics of your install at [email protected] and I can see if anything looks weird.

 

[snakedew]

Update. After
taking my upper arm loose, I decided to do some research on the rod ends and firgure out what their called. I found out their called “heim joints” and their notorious for squeaking and clunking. I went to a forum on DF kit car and a guy had my same issue. The thread: https://dfkitcar.com/forum/index.php?threads/front-end-heim-joints.948/page-3
said I should use some type of dry lube on my heim joints to quiet them. The only problem is that lubing the joints worked for some, but not all the people who did it. Also I found a guy who just replaced the heim joints all-together with some different ones from this site: https://www.kartek.com/parts/fk-rod...8-hole-kmx12-10-nylon-coated-heim-joints.html
Im going to order some of that dupont dry ptfe lube and see how it goes.

 

[Built6spdMCSS]

If they are "clunking" there's slack in there somewhere.

A Heim Joint is supposed to have pivot movement with no slop.

Take measurement of the length of the joint with the bushings on each side and then measurement of the bracket it goes into and see if there is a large difference.