Failed Whiteline KTA124 Lateral Link

[sheppo9]

Had a set of the Whiteline KTA124 arms installed for between 14 - 16 months, loved the adjustment and ability to get a wheel alignment right, and recommended them to friends and on forums.

2 days ago the car was up on a hoist getting checked over and the mechanic points in amazement at the left hand, front of the rear Lateral Link (which adjusts Toe), this is what we found;







I have another picture of it still on the car (it's on a different computer, and will upload it later today or tonight), as it couldn't be changed - back to the stock arm, as I don't carry a spare Lateral Link in the car...

The car has never been ran up a gutter or been involved in a rear ender.

I sent the (still to be uploaded here) picture of the arm still on the car to Whiteline - I admit it's not the best or clearest picture, I was using a phone, but you could still see where the arm had separated.
Whiteline got back to me saying (quote from email);

Hi,

As these are looking older and you said you bought them well over a year ago they are out of warranty.
I can also see allot of other performance bits on the car so I gather it gets some kind of hard work !.

We helped out with free bushes but we are unable to send out free arms as we do not have separate pieces they are made in kit form.

The photo does not show the crack maybe you can get it welded or it is a matter of buying new arms.

They look older as they where covered in grease/road grime as it's a daily driver (100km a day), and just like their sway bar bushes, the Lateral Link bushes squeak too.

The car has Whiteline swaybars, Whiteline ALK, Whiteline R.C.K (gee what a great thing they are, 4 sets I needed and they flogged out the knuckles on both sides...), Tein Flex coilovers, and these Lateral Links.

The "free bushes" he's talking about where to replace the Lateral Link bushes as no amount of grease would shut them up.

The car has never seen a track in it's life and rarely gets "beaten on", it is afterall an Outback.
And as I told him, the hardest work it gets is driving up a driveway or putting the dog in the back.

After pulling the arm off the car, I do not feel confident in getting it welded up.
They want to gouge me $524 (plus postage!!) for a new set of arms.



Summing up, if you have these make sure you check them - and if you have a R.C.K, check them too - and if you have a A.L.K on a newer STi, check them too - if you've got Whiteline Sway Bar Links, check them too.



C/N's - Lateral Link broke, Whiteline say GTFO.


UPDATE - After having a chat with Andy Nolan at Whiteline, he's sending out a new kit and i'll be sending back the old kit for them to find out what happened.

[Gambit]

now thats gotta suck bigtime, post it on a number of forums and cain whiteline for it repeatedly the bastards...

Otherwise escalate the case, ask to speak to the GM or something and have it looked into by someone else other than customer service. As it looks like those lateral links need to be reinforced in future production runs.

[Arith]

Yikes! That's scary. Good luck with getting it fixed! But it's a bit of a grey area because it's out of the warranty period, so Whiteline won't probably do much to help you out, even if the part did fail on an epic level.

Oddly enough, my Whiteline front sway bar has started to make a popping noise whenver I drive over a hump or driveway. I spoke with Phat who says the nolathane bushings they use tend to fail faster. That's why I'm moving to Cusco sway bars which issue rubber bushings instead.

[sheppo9]

now thats gotta suck bigtime, post it on a number of forums and cain whiteline for it repeatedly the bastards...

It's on 6 different forums now, including NASIOC, LegacyGT and Rexnet who I know Whiteline do visit from time to time.

Yikes! That's scary. Good luck with getting it fixed! But it's a bit of a grey area because it's out of the warranty period, so Whiteline won't probably do much to help you out, even if the part did fail on an epic level.

That's what I was thinking and Whiteline is banking on.

[Kevlar GT]

Yikes! That's scary. Good luck with getting it fixed! But it's a bit of a grey area because it's out of the warranty period, so Whiteline won't probably do much to help you out, even if the part did fail on an epic level.

That's what I was thinking and Whiteline is banking on.

Good on you, bad press travels quickly. Given you haven't said anything slanderous it's not an issue for you either. All good for them to make assumptions on your driving style though "You've got our other parts on your car so you obviously flog the life out of it". Pfffft!

They wouldn't admit it was a fault on their part for that fact it would open a can of worms. See what happens I guess.

[teK--]

I wonder if the weld has failed due to binding (bushes seized up due to lack of lubrication).

If the weld failed due to a defect (not overloading) then wouldn't it have failed earlier?

I have only ever heard of 3 Whiteline products having a failure:

1: Swaybar snapped in half (within weeks of install). Isolated incident covered by warranty
2: Ball Joint pulling away for roll centre kit (mass revision of all parts, free changeover for existing owners)
3. My anti Lift kit bush split in half due to casting issue (within months of install). Isolated incident covered by warranty. INterestingly the replacement kit had one bush which was already splitting when brand new.

What I'm suggesting is that Whiteline's warranty is quite good from my experience and that the 1 year warranty shouldn't really play a part if is a genuine defect.

Outside of manufacturer defect and if they will not give any goodwill, you are really only covered by statutory warranty which means its up to you to prove the product is defective or not fit for purpose.

[Kevlar GT]

^ Now you've heard of four.

[subnub]

Based on the second pic it looks like it has been cracked about 3/4 of the way through for some time. You could possibly argue that point, but given you do 100km/day they might say that although it obviously cracked in two or more stages, without a metallurgy test/engineer's report (worth getting one??) the age of the cracking is hard to determine. Might be worth a go though.

And I agree with whoever it was above that said try to get past the frontline customer service people, speak to someone higher up if it's at all possible. Once you get past the phone jockeys most companies are pretty keen to look after the reputation of their brand.

[libsti]

ive just upgrade my whiteline front and rear sway bars with cusco, i also got all new links installed, contact phat gt , thats where i got mine from and they where no where near the $ 400 you where quoted.

[Kekotic]

libsti, Phat actually told me about you on the phone the other day
Honestly if I had my time again, I would not have bought the whiteline swaybar.
From all the things PHAT has told me (the guy knows too damn much!) Cusco is just so much better, and often the same price as well!

For example, PHAT was telling me that Whiteline use a (might get the names wrong) Hot rolling system to bend their bars, and in doing so the bar doesn't maintain the same rigidity throughout, and sections will be weaker/stronger than others. Cusco use a cold rolling system to bend the bars, so it maintains the same strength throughout the whole bar. Just stuff like that makes me wish I hadn't gone through Whiteline, their products seem good, but from what PHAT has told me, Cusco is so much better. And I would trust PHAT GT with my life

[Arith]

ive just upgrade my whiteline front and rear sway bars with cusco, i also got all new links installed, contact phat gt , thats where i got mine from and they where no where near the $ 400 you where quoted.

You copy cat! I'm switching to Cusco sways and links on Monday as well! While the Whitelines were seductively cheap, I should have paid a bit extra for a quality JDM product.

[libsti]

ive just upgrade my whiteline front and rear sway bars with cusco, i also got all new links installed, contact phat gt , thats where i got mine from and they where no where near the $ 400 you where quoted.

You copy cat! I'm switching to Cusco sways and links on Monday as well! While the Whitelines were seductively cheap, I should have paid a bit extra for a quality JDM product.

copy cat???? ive had mine for 2 weeks now, whos coping who?

[teK--]

don't worry your Whiteline swaybars aren't going to explode

[Kekotic]

don't worry your Whiteline swaybars aren't going to explode

But they might start to get noisy after a few months

[teK--]

Mine are a year old no noise.

I was your links which were loose which caused noise though?

Also get lateral links if you have movement problem (i didn't need them but YMMV)