Today we're going to talk about rod ends. An integral part of your suspension on your race car.
Hi I'm Damien Brase this is Tim Anderson. Today we're going to be talking about rod ends
different styles different types when and where to use them. Tim what do we want to look at when
we're trying to figure out our rod ends? First thing you're going to ask is you know where
is it going on the car. There's so many different areas on which rod ends are used. They're used in
suspension components shift and throttle linkages maybe some adjustable bracing
of that nature. So it just all depends on where you're putting it on your car. Okay well
what I guess let's start with like a four link. Where what would we want to use on a four link?
So any suspension component we're going to highly recommend you use the chromoly rod end. Some in
our x-series line strong chromoly steel even our pc-series which is the black rod ends that you see
those have the highest strength those are what you want to use there. Just to not have any type of
failure all the power that you're putting to it or you're on a race track and you're bumping
banging wheels and stuff you want to have a very strong the strongest one you can put there. So
on the x-series this is a one-piece body and the ball's actually the body's machine so the ball can
be dropped in here and it's actually locked in so that's going to take side loading better as well.
Well we talked about our endura series or x-series rod ends here but we've got our two-piece pcy
and our three-piece rod ends. When would you use those Tim?
both are a chromoly steel body the two-piece uh pc series has the ball swedged inside the body. These
typically have really good misalignment angles so they can have a lot of movement to them a lot of
strength used on all sorts of uh you know very common in the circle track race car world. The
three piece chromoly rod end this doesn't quite have the misalignment angle as that one does. But
because of its three-piece design with it has a a ball a race swedged inside the housing those are
your three pieces. They typically move a little bit freer and just smoother and more efficient
than some of the others so it's just they don't handle the side load quite as much as a two-piece
so you would want to install them into a double shear mount as opposed to a single shear
mounting. And then we've also got our high misalignment pcy series
that's typically going to be used on a dirt circle track car where there's a lot of suspension
articulation. Yeah those are commonly used on the outer tie rod end on a any type of circle track
car really where you're getting a lot of travel and the way the tie rod mounts up to the spindle
you just start running out of travel there on these high travel front ends so
definitely a good one to have up there to make sure you're not binding your suspension up
and lots of misalignment angles you can tell. Takes up a little more space in the mount but
a great rod end to have in that situation. One of our most popular rod ends used in all sorts of
applications would be our two-piece carbon rod end it's got it more of a general use type rod end.
Damien where would be a situation where I would use a two-piece kind of low load
rod end? For a low load application or a non-critical application the two pieces work
great. Something this size or maybe a little smaller would be used on a sway bar end link
something where if it is going to fail it's not going to cause a catastrophic issue. So
you really don't need that extra strength. Also the two-piece works great in a throttle linkage
or a shifter linkage. Now in an application like that you would want to go to a metal on metal rod
end where the ball is very free moving you don't want to have your throttle linkage stick open.
So a couple of good applications for those. Yeah and just to add what Damien was talking about
there's a ptfe line or a metal to metal which does not have ptfe between the ball and the race.
The ptfe liner will run a little bit stiffer it has a little more
kind of grab to it with the liner in there so anything that you need to move very free like
a throttle linkage or a shift linkage some of that nature you would not need to use a ptfe line
nor would you want to. So we've discussed everything on the table here except this red
one. This is our a series aluminum rod end when would we want to use an aluminum rod end Tim?
Various applications I think they're mainly you know what they're mainly used for would be
you know support braces whether you got say a splitter or a spoiler where you got an
adjustable brace on. You know something that needs to be really lightweight
that's gonna work well there. Anything that's gonna be you know non-critical you wouldn't
really use these on a suspension component um it's not not a good weight savings I guess alternative
and then maybe you know something is not critical or not having a high load
on it. So they work fine for like a sway bar end link something along the lines of that
and yeah there's supports or adjustments that are I guess don't see as high lows where you'd want to
use a stronger rod end. Sure. So a question we get often would be you know where would you use a ptfe
lined rod end versus a metal to metal. I would say most of the time you know if you're doing anything
suspension wise and you're not going to be down there taking a look at it maintenancing it.
You're more likely you want to use a ptfe line because it is maintenance free you don't need to
to lubricate it at all it's self-lubricating if you prefer to lubricate your own rod ends
then you can go with the metal the metal. You know if you're
having to put a rod in in a place where it's going to see really high temperatures
you would not want to use a ptfe lined one there. So if I'm building a support for my turbo and
using rod ends on that I probably want to go with the metal on metal? Correct. Yep. It's also good
to remember that rod ends are a wear item and they are going to have to be replaced at some point.
You know the life cycle on a rod end it's going to depend on how it's being used how much load what
type of conditions it's in you know is it dirty sandy is it a corrosive environment. So if you're
using rodents on your race car you want to make sure you inspect them on a regular basis. When
they start to loosen up and they start to get play in them then you're going to want to replace them.
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