Hit curb.. need repair advice

[amblerman]

Hi folks,

My wife was driving my 1999 S70 non-turbo manual. She got too close to the curb and some excitement commenced. She's fine which is the important part. The car however, is a bit sad right now.

No exterior body damage occurred amazingly.
The obvious damage is:
1) broken control arm
2) inner CV joint came apart.

What I did so far is take the broken bits apart.
My concern is that there is something bent that isn't obvious to me.

I happened to have a used control arm (from when I replace them 9 months ago) and I wanted to put that on so that I could easily roll the car in my driveway to a better location. However it's proving tough to get back in so I'm worried that the control arm attachment brackets got bent. I am almost sure they did.

My question is how to tell how badly the car was damaged and how to go about fixing it. Pictures are below. To the untrained eye (mine) and without knowing what to measure and look at, it seems like the damage was limited to the control arm, CV joint, and control arm brackets. But I really don't know.

Please look at pictures and let me know what you think. Any suggestions on how to adjust brackets for a non=professional so I can get the control arm in ?

Thanks
Andy

How control arm broke:

brokencontrolarm.png (499.58 KiB) Viewed 1928 times

How control arm twisted.

twistedcontrolarm.png (470.68 KiB) Viewed 1928 times

Rear mount To me this looks like it bent rearward.

rearmount.png (382.38 KiB) Viewed 1928 times

Front Mount This looks less damaged.

frontmount.png (205.77 KiB) Viewed 1928 times

[Clemens]

Good lord... must have been quite an impact.
I'd try to bend the mounting brackets with a hammer. That could work. I believe this is safe as this is steel, not aluminum (old engineers' saying: what bends doesn't break). Then take the car for a drive and see if it feels safe.

[scot850]

Glad your wife is safe.

As to the car, the rearmost bracket looks the worst. The sides of the 'pocket should be perpendicular to each other. The bottom left of the bracket needs to be bent down so it looks more like the front of it. Then the top looks like it needs to get flattened as the top should be flat.

With a hit that hard, I would be looking also at the sub-frame mounts to check they are not damaged.

From the picture of the rear mount on the sub-frame, check the welds for cracks. If none, you may have dodged a bullet.

Naturally, when straightening the control arm brackets, check the ends of the control arm will fit snug with maybe a little persuasion to fit home.

Good Luck!

Neil.

[oragex]

Since those brackets keep the control arm in place, you can't see if there are tiny cracks in it that would slowly weaken it. I would ask a specialist in body damage, maybe he could fit new brackets and weld them securely. He can also talk about the subframe and check the other components, steering rack, end links, wheels, etc.

[abscate]

Heat , bend, then retemper...but I would have an expert do that

[FlyingVolvo]

I concur with Neil, that's a hard hit and I'd be worried about a bent subframe. May be worth seeing if there's a non-crashed one at a junkyard you can get. I'd also be worried about damage to the steering rack.

[tryingbe]

Get a new subframe. I have one you can have, but I'm in AZ.

[amblerman]

Hi Folks,

Thanks for all the replies. I wanted to provide an updated and a plan of action here.

I did get my old control arm back in the car and my car pushed up to the top of my driveway. Now it's not in the way anymore.

As mentioned above, I was having trouble getting my used control arm to fit in the brackets.

I initially tried to fashion a bending tool out of 4ft pipe and a "T" fitting. I cut the "T" fitting to fit the control arm bracket. I then bolted the "T" fitting into the bracket and screwed a 4 ft piece of pipe into the fitting to use as a lever.
It was a nice idea but it failed at the weakest link which was the threaded end of the 4 ft pipe. It just ripped apart. I'm not even sure I moved the bracket at all.

To get the bracket to fit, I adjusted the control arm itself. I know this is not idea and not recommended but this control arm is a short term fix anyway.
I used my grinder to shave a little bit from this area

controlend.png (50.98 KiB) Viewed 1801 times

I only shaved off about a 1/8 inch total spread across both sides of both ends of the control arm.
That did leave a gap between one end of the contol arm and the bracket. I made up for that with a washer.

I know that isn't ideal and does in fact point to some movement/damage to my control arm brackets.

My plan is to :
a) get the car driving again (rebuild CV joint)
b) drive on my street to make sure it's drivable
c) drive a mile to my mechanic to get it looked at .
d) repair for real once I know what's going on.

As some of you have mentioned, that repair might be a used subframe but I hope not. That's a big job.
I did tell my 17 year old that I found out summer project.

Thanks again

Andy

[FLXC90]

Honestly, a subframe change is probably less work than an A/C evaporator core. Just bigger, heavier pieces. Done in layers

[abscate]

Amblerman , I’ve got the engine hanger which makes swapping the sub frame a snap. It took me about 3 hours TOM drop it for a clutch job on my P2.

...and I’ve got a friend in Ambler who drives through frequently....just off 309

I’ll be picking up my Bryn Mawr muffin soon, too