FYI - IE race camber plate clunking - FIXED

[JGood]

I've been battling a clunking in my front end for months. Replaced everything. Over bumps, it sounded someone was pounding on my subframe with a hammer.

The IE plates use COM-10T spherical bearings. The camber plate uses a circlip to hold the bearing in place. The plates are machined slightly larger in depth, and IE provides extremely thin washers so you can shim the bearing as needed for a tight fit. I shimmed mine as much as I could, but there was a tiny amount of play still. One more shim, and the circlip would not fit. Apparantly this insanely small amount of play is enough to make some serious noise.

My fix was to bend the circlip a bit, to basically shape it like a lock washer, so it acts as a spring to hold the bearing in place. So far, it's been about 500 miles, not a single noise.

If anyone else has any thoughts or input, feel free to chime in. Just figured I'd share my fix, in case anyone else is dealing with this. I'm hoping this is a permanent fix, or at least semi-permanent (I don't mind re-bending the clip every year or two if needed)


Here is the circlip I'm referring to. I didn't take any pics, so I stole this one from the interwebs:

[IRON-E]

I had the same issues as you with my IE camber plates. All of this happened after a year of no issues. Rebuilt them twice (bearings, washers, circlips) and still had play in them after the 2nd time around.

Maybe someone else has had a different experience with them but, I opted to just remove them and go back to stock strut hats, until I can buy a set of GC race or Vorschlag ones.

Nobody wants to purchase mine, even after I rebuilt them for the sale.....

[JGood]

I had the same issues as you with my IE camber plates. All of this happened after a year of no issues. Rebuilt them twice (bearings, washers, circlips) and still had play in them after the 2nd time around.

Maybe someone else has had a different experience with them but, I opted to just remove them and go back to stock strut hats, until I can buy a set of GC race or Vorschlag ones.

Nobody wants to purchase mine, even after I rebuilt them for the sale.....

Bend that clip and put them back in!

[jalopi]

How thick are those shims? Maybe try filing one of them down so that you get the necessary tight fit but still get the c clip in there. Kinda had to do the same thing with my PS pump shims. Basically I took a real wide file, put it in a vice and then rubbed the shim on it for a good 2-3 mins.

On a different note, I agree with Iron - I should've not been cheap and spent the extra $100 odd bucks to get GC mounts. After seeing them in person I can really say that the quality of the IE mounts pales in comparison to the GC ones.

[JGood]

How thick are those shims? Maybe try filing one of them down so that you get the necessary tight fit but still get the c clip in there. Kinda had to do the same thing with my PS pump shims. Basically I took a real wide file, put it in a vice and then rubbed the shim on it for a good 2-3 mins.

On a different note, I agree with Iron - I should've not been cheap and spent the extra $100 odd bucks to get GC mounts. After seeing them in person I can really say that the quality of the IE mounts pales in comparison to the GC ones.

They are incredibly thin, as in, slightly thicker then aluminum foil haha. If you touched it with a file it would probably tear it lol.

I tried filing the circlip a bit, because it was so close to fitting in the groove with an extra shim. That's when I got the idea to bend it and gave up with the filing.

[IRON-E]

Bend that clip and put them back in!

I added all 3 shims + the c clip, which does do it's job, to keep it tight/snug but it's the bearings that fail. After about a few months of street usage they started clunking and, I really hated the looks I would get at meets, when turning my steering wheel.

[JGood]

I added all 3 shims + the c clip, which does do it's job, to keep it tight/snug but it's the bearings that fail. After about a few months of street usage they started clunking and, I really hated the looks I would get at meets, when turning my steering wheel.

What bearings were you using? I've had mine in for 2 years/20k miles of street use, still on the original bearings with no play or wear.

I also don't have any popping noises or anything when turning, were the needle bearings an issue with yours as well?

[nrubenstein]

GC Touring plates are hands down the best option for a street car.

[jalopi]

and for a race car?

[IRON-E]

What bearings were you using? I've had mine in for 2 years/20k miles of street use, still on the original bearings with no play or wear.

I also don't have any popping noises or anything when turning, were the needle bearings an issue with yours as well?

Using the bearings provided by IE., Initially my needle bearings from the spring hat, went out because they weren't sandwiched correctly.
That only added to the up and down play, on my camber plates and braking them as a result. Rebuilt them correctly, sandwiched the needle bearings with the 2 big washer for the spring hats, re-did the camber plate bearings and shims again., all looked and felt right for about 3 months. I even went as far as adding motorcycle chain grease to keep everything nicely lubed but.......... nope, it did it again.
They still went bad, and because of the up and down play, also marred the bottom threads of my struts, I fixed that by adding another nut to the top of the strut, to lock it in place.

So now I've purchased KONI adjustables, new coil over sleeves, shortened strut housings and waiting on the new camber plates (won't be putting the IEs on ever), to redo my front suspension again.

For a budget set up, it works but doesn't last very long....... or maybe L.A. roads are really crappie and they can't handle that much abuse.

[JGood]

So the initial issue was improper installation of the needle bearing/plates?

If your shock threads got damaged, that means the nut came loose... especially if you corrected it by adding another nut on top of it... A lock nut is all that's needed.

The nut on the shock simply locks the shock into the inner ball of the spherical bearing. Regardless of what happens with the bearing or the plate, that inner ball isn't going to shrink in size and allow play... so nothing can really happen to the threads as long as that nut is tightened.

Unless I'm not understanding your problem.

Also, FYI, COM-10T bearings are teflon lined (T), which are not supposed to be lubed with anything.

[JGood]

Just as an update, the camber plates did eventually start making noise again, so the "bent snap ring" is not a permanent fix. What I did to fix it this time was file down the snap ring enough to be able to fit another shim in with the bearing. It actually didn't take much filing, just enough to make it shiny. Then I just used a big socket and rubber mallet to pound the clip into place, along with reversing the snap ring pliers to force the snap ring to spread apart and go into the groove. Took maybe 15 minutes total, and now there is zero play. It's amazing how that tiny bit of play (the depth of one of those paper-thin shims) can create so much noise! Unless those shims compress over time like a crush washer, there shouldn't be any more noise from here on out.