Alright, anybody out there have rod ends on their street/strip car? Are they really as noisy & clunky as everyone says?

I have an old style adjustable torque arm from Spohn with the rod end connecting it to the crossmember and I haven't noticed anything in the many years I've had it on the car.

I have Global West rod ended LCAs and PHR on my 4th gen street car. It is a little noisy. Not bad though!

IF>>>>IF you use GOOD TEFLON LINED ones the noise wont be an issue... Mine made/still dont make any noise ..I had them for years.. BUT I used good QA1 teflon lined ones..

I have them on my car. I havce the spohn ones with Rod ends on one end and fatory ends on the other. No problems here

I run them but I don not use ordinary ones from vendors- they will not last. I have massive rodends on my rear suspension that carry a load rating of 55,692. The original ones most vendors used where a QA1 PCMR12 that have a load rating of 25,000- I wasted these in two months. Now most vendors use the QA1 PRMT-12 version with a rating of 34,319 (T is for teflon, These lasted me 14 months and still died under hard daily use. I now run a massive HMR12HCPT ends with the 55,692 load rating and they are still solid as can be after over 3 years. Steve Spohn did me a special favor and got them for me since we were kindof doing eachother favors-(I listed this because you'll probably ask me next where I got them and how much) They are expensive and list for $100ea range- but they are well worth it because I would have gone through 3 more sets of the PRM's and these are still noise free.

Good point- the Global West and Unbalanced Engineering ones I use for racing are the same as for my street cars, have countless hours on both with no problems and years of racing between myself and other CMC folks.

HPE, since you have a 3 piece rod, how do you keep the dirt, sand, etc out of the rod end? I see your point with the strength issue. I searched a few sites and most of the vendors use QA1 XM-12 Series which are rated at 28,081 pounds. Within the XM series they do have XM10-12 which is still a 3/4-16 thread but rated at 40,572 pounds. They also have XM12-14 which is a 7/8-14 thread and rated at 55,692 pounds. I'm just concerned about dirts, etc getting into the rod ends which makes me want to stick with the MX Endura series. What do you think?

A lot of this depends upon the road condition. For some time I ran the rear trailing arms with the QA1 teflon/kevlar joints. On a smooth or reasonably smooth roads there wasn't any noise. Highway driving was good. It actually rode smoother with these arms over the stock ones.

The problem was on rough and rippled roads, the noise would get bad. So bad that I eventually took them off and replaced them with stock boxed arms with replacement rubber bushings.

RBob.

I live in sunny So Calif- road dirt, salt, severe wetness, etc really is a non issue for me. If this is a concern they might I suggest simple rodend seals which can be bought through Summit Racing. these are metal and rubber washer seals that fit next to the rod end swivel and keep everything out of them They are cheap and cheerful. I run them on my mini offroad buggies.

I have rod ends on my car, but they are on the axle end. The LCAs are rubber ended (custom ones) and the PHB is poly end on the body. I like them. They react predictably and have a pretty decent ride. The rubber I have on the LCAs is much quieter than the old Spohn poly ones.
Note: All my rod ends are QA1. They are $30 a piece new. Cheaper rod ends will be louder and not last as long.

i run all rod ends on my rear suspension from the torque arm to the panhard bar to the LCAs. In the 4th gen crowd they run them in the front control arms as well, figure on 10k-15k out of the quality ones before you replace them, I replace the ones on my car every 4 years or so since it isn't driven much just to play it safe.

Thanks for all your opinions and experiences. Much appreciated.