Goofy lower control arms from O'Reilly!

[AlaskaFestivaGuy]

O'Reilly sold me what appears to be goofy LCAs.

See photos. The all-black part came off an 89LX with 130K miles -- probably original.

The other part was sold to me by O'Reilly. The blue plastic is very thick not-very-flexible plastic -- not rubber. When I complained to the store, they just said "We sell what the software tells us to sell you; we don't know anything about cars. They claim that the blue part will "crush" when installed and work properly.

I disagree. Moreover, how exactly would I crush it -- jack the .car up higher and put a bottle jack under the LCA as I reassemble things and jack it into position?

What am I missing here … or is O'Reilly full of it? BTW, this is presently my only daily driver that I trust. I'm on the verge of reinstalling the original part (which has a tear in its boot). I have AutoZone investigating and will pay a visit to Napa tomorrow(Sunday) morning.

NOTE: The blue thing is NOT a protective cover. There was a very hard black plastic protective cover on top of the blue thing (not pictured).

LCA -- Left original Right OReilly.JPG LDA -- Lower original Upper OReilly.JPG

[WmWatt]

Hmmm. The older ones come pre-crushed and the manufactuer is saving labour cost by having the cusomer crush?

[AlaskaFestivaGuy]

I guess! It makes absolutely no sense to me. I'll be visiting Autozone and Napa this morning to see what they think and what they offer. O'Reilly tried to get me to believe that the only thing available these days is "customer crushes" nonsense.

I'll also check with the local Kia dealer on Monday. Perhaps they offer proper rubber boots that will fit the O'Reilly LCAs. I'd like to replace all of my LCAs anyway b/c the rubber bushings at the inboard ends are showing signs of age after 30 years.

Between this and nonsense like Boeing's "point the nose down" software, I'm almost wondering if somebody's smuggling "stupid pills" across our southern border!

[AlaskaFestivaGuy]

Autozone and Napa offer the same stuff -- they say it's neoprene.

So I rigged up a short bottle jack to push the outboard end of the LCA into the bottom of the spindle in order to insert the pinch bolt.

I still am not convinced the this neoprene material won't crack over time or in cold weather!

[firebush357]

Pretty sure that is normal and that it will squish down once you install it. It will eventually crack on the sides but they all do that with time and weather.

[WmWatt]

I might want to pack with gease to keep water from leaking in at top.