I went to get an alignment today, and the person doing the alignment managed to get everything within spec besides the rear driver side toe. He said he tried to get it to move, but it was seized. I remember watching them do my alignment and I noticed 3 of them over there fighting with something, so im assuming it must be legit. Anyways, ive been trying to find the part online but cant seem to locate it. does anyone know where to get one? Also, has anyone had any experiences with this problem and fixing it?

 

Heres a picture of the rear assembly. Could anyone point out to me which parts need to ordered? Im going to try get under my car this week and take a look at it all. But any suggestions on whether I should replace the bolt and the arm or just the bolt.

 

18 is the adjusting bolt 19 is the cam plate and 30 is the nut. The bolt is probably frozen inside the bushing in the control arm.
New parts are needed, but it may be a bear getting the old bolt out without destroying the bushing, then a new arm will be needed.

 

Thanks for the advice. Im probably going to end up buying it all. ill try follow up eventually.

 

smart man.buy it all. no need to hassle trying to wiggle the bolt out with out damage to the arm. when this happens, ive rarely seen the arm make it out okay. also. many of them have been torched off or heated to make it easier to remove bolt/arm.
good luck and becareful. remember to use safety stands

 

Just a thought, apply Never-seize to the bolt body/shaft.

 

Update:

Went under to take a look for myself. heres what i saw

Here is the arm in question

A slight close up

Zoomed in of the close up


Now the question i have is if its even worth to replace it all. I mean maybe the nut, but the whole arm seems excessive at this point. Any opinions?

 

replace the nut. if you can adjust the toe, then no need for the arm. doesnt seem that bad. i was under the impression there was lots of rust around bolt/nut arm housing. seems more like a stripped nut.

 

Problem is that to adjust the toe the bolt needs to be turned, but I assume the bolt is "frozen" inside the bushing and can't be turned, therefore no toe adjustment.
If this is the case, at times the bolt can be a bear to loosen up. Keep spraying PB Blaster for several days then try to turn, hammer and punch may help, but the rubber bushing absords the shock, if there is room, a balljopint press is helpfull (similar to a large C clamp but much stronger), then there is the torch method.

 

i just went for an alignment today and they told me the same thing, that it was seized. mine looks way worse than yours! im going to replace the lower control arms on both sides. any tips for getting it un-seized?

 

As stated, over a period of time, use a lot of PB Blaster first and if no luck bring out the backups. Try hammer and punch, an air hammer with a point is helpful, a ball joint press has been used. When all else fails, resort to the torch and be done with it, but then you'll need the entire arm. If you try whacking on the bolt after the nut is removed, be careful that the bracket doesn't start to separate. You can always put a large C clamp over the brackets to retain rigidity, but it's got to be a HD clamp. Some use a Sawzall, but the bolt is hardened steel and is difficult to cut and then you'll need to seperate the brackets to drop the arm, not to my liking, so bite the bullet and have them torched and be done with the job quickly.

 

which is a better alignment kit? Eibach or Ingalls or a different brand?

 

Hopefully they did not strip the nut on the end of the bolt. I have had great luck using PB Blast on many applications in my field of work on some gigantic nuts and bolts, and can almost guarantee it will work. Sometimes adding heat will work but do not go crazy to where you end up melting the thing!

 

@Sutitan & @nmso4 - did you guys both end up replacing the entire control arms? I'm in the same situation you guys are @115K on my '05 TSX... thinking about keeping the car for another 12-18 months, not sure if it's worth replacing....

EDIT: I should note, that while the individual toes are out of spec, the total toe is within spec --
Rear left toe: 0.26 deg (spec'd range: 0.00 - 0.16)
Rear right toe: -0.07 deg (spec'd range: 0.00 - 0.16)
Total rear toe: 0.16 deg (spec'd range: 0.00 - 0.31)

 

I PBblasted it for a few days over a week. I figured the first time got it loose, and the other times it just sort of cleaned out the rust as well as making it looser. Not sure if that was the case, but I took it to get aligned and they didnt complain. Im assuming it worked

 

Lots of PB blaster. The correct size socket on a nice long ratchet and a B.F.H. should get it done.

 

I was told the same thing by the alignment technician this weekend. A seized eccentric bolt at rear driver side.
I called Acura this morning and told them exactly what the problem is and the service advisor told me they cannot tell if it is covered under warranty unless they see it.
I don't want to bring the car in just so they can say it is not covered and charge me the diagnostic fee. I have told them what the problem is and I don't know how more obvious it can get when they check it.
Does anyone know if it is covered by warranty or where to get the arm and bolt a good price? It is a CPO with extended warranty and less than 60k miles.

 

Looks as if it would be covered as the only exception:
fastening/security hardware for non-covered components, stripped or cross threaded fasteners

If they say they won't cover the condition, have them show you the exception in the CPO warranty.

 

I had the same issue with my 04. I ended up having to buy 2 new arms and hardware and had to cut the old ones out. It actually wasn't too bad with some fresh sawzall blades.

 

I have this problem with my 05 tl. So basically the fix is just PB blast the living hell out of it carefully hit with a hammer or pull out a wad of cash. What would I need to replace exactly so I know what im looking at money and parts wise.