Quality of replacement parts - survey.

[DeLorean]

Well I have an interesting one here. Steering rack related. Recently I replaced the rack boots on my 88 SPG, due to them dry rotting and cracking through. Apparently while the boot was bad some water must have gotten in and rusted one of the output shafts. Shortly after I replaced the boot, the side that had some internal rust failed, and started leaking P/S fluid.

This rack was probably 7 or 8 years old, and it was the later type with the cast spool.

I had 3 steering racks sitting on the shelf here for about a year. Still in the box. Pulled them off the shelf, and they showed signs of the same rubber cracking starting. Obviously these are defective components. Hopefully the seals they used aren't as shitty as the boots are!

I also question a lot of other components. Has anyone used the sub $50 drive axles from eeuroparts? How could they make them that cheap, when the OE manufactured outer end used to be almost $300.

Would anyone want to be putting 250HP through a $50 drive axle? Hows the boot life I wonder? Hopefully better than the steering racks... Anyone else have a component like that that SHOULD have lasted 10 years last for 1? Is there any way to tell what rubber is absolute trash and what rubber is good? I would hate to do something like replace suspension bushings in a C-900 only to find out they are all failing again the following year and I would have been better off just not touching the original 280K mile bushings.

[Sam]

I just bought the house brand eeuroparts axles for my C900 which i installed a few weeks ago. They appeared to be pretty high quality. The fit and finish was nicer than the reman cardone axles on my 9-5. The cardones I'm comparing are the the 99-01 axles which are smaller in diameter than the 02+ which have different spindles which were certainly designed for less horsepower than the later ones. The cardones were fine on that car and it is a Mackan "270hp" stage 1.

Its worth noting that there is a third option for the c900 EMPIs which i have used in the past as well. Jordan told me those were solid a few years ago.

My ranking

#1 Cardone Reman
#2 Eeuro house brand. These might actually be EMPI sourced but are made differently
#3 Empi generics

[Jordan]

The Empi drive axles I've used in street cars and race cars. No problems as of yet. I've heard from a co worker who used to be much more involved in the domestic market side that Cardone used to be very good, and now they are not.

The Surtrack axles are the answer to a shortage of empi (Empire now). Personally I like the Empire over surtrack. Issues seem to be more of assembly with the wrong parts (tripods too big) more than sub-standard materials.

Stay away from Karyln suspension and rubber. Trying to phase those out of the catalog entirely.

Chinese rubber can be a crap shoot. They may choose the wrong material at first and later fix the issue. Most aftermarket companies will fix problems while euro OE companies tend to be less responsive.

Just to add fuel to the fire, SPNA (Saab Parts NA) has started buying many items from Professional Parts Sweden (Proparts) and then just sticking their Genuine label on it and marking it up 3x. If we find that is the case, we will stop selling the Genuine Item and market only the proparts.

[Sam]

I realize the ones i called eeuro house brand were actually Suretrack. These are definitely good quality as I said previously. I would not hesitate to buy more at that price point. My cardone axles were from ebay and I believe they were made a few years ago so what Jordan says regarding poor quality could certainly be true.

The proparts stuff is complete crap in my experience and I avoid it. On a positive note the used parts market for T7 cars has hit an all time high, and I can now get a lot of stuff in north jersey that i would have otherwise needed to drive up to central CT or PA for.

On a side note, i noticed that when you hold the empi axles up to the drive cup on a C900 they look like there is no way they can fit and have the aforementioned oversized tripod problem. But sure enough if you rotate them a few times they go right in.

[Jordan]

Proparts is really all over the place. For the majority of parts I've seen, they are good value for the money and offer many aftermarket solutions to NLS products. They are better than ScanTech which had an affiliation of leadership, but now is owned by Dorman. Products and companies change fast. I wouldn't pigeon hole any of the emerging brands too quickly. Even Karlyn, who has a partnership with STI which is also Bremi, is generally high quality ignition components...just don't buy a ball joint from them. At least not now.

eeuro doesn't really have a house brand. The surtrack changeover is very recent and only on items that we can't get a supply from elsewhere. Before this, it was all Empi/Empire axles.

[RobVonSAAB]

Everything I've gotten from Eeuroparts has been great. Rock auto is rife with catalog errors and incorrect parts. I worked at a few saab Indy shops and I get way better prices and quality is better than the parts that came to those shops. Low, prices, fast shipping, and no errors so far...keep up the good work Eeuroparts!!

[Jordan]

thanks. Things are far from perfect, but things are improving every day. Rob do you have a wholesale account you use?

[Sam]

Just wanted to provide an update here. I bought 2 cardone axles as a pair from some ebay seller about a year ago. I only needed one at the time so i shelved the other as a spare. I notived the rubber cracking when i replaced the trans and swapped in the one i had on the shelf.

Two words: catastrophic failure. The axle sounded horrible and i heard crunching on day 1 of use. I pulled the axle out and found that only one tripod bearing was still intact. The others had fallen off and were getting crunched up in there. From now on i only go to eeuroparts. Thanks to jordan we can actually buy oem quality axles for a fair price. Otherwise i would be out of luck as empi supply has not met demand for some time now.

[DeLorean]

I had a cardone "rebuilt" one detonate after short period as well, years and years ago now. I still say genuine on axles... if it CAN be rebuilt and it's not all cupped, run it.

[Sam]

The newer axles are a pain to rebuild because there is a retainer ring thing which secures the tripod inside the receiver. These have to be cut off very carefully with a grinder. without that cup the axles tend to be noisy and this is just way too much work just to replace the boot. On 9-5 and 9-3 there is no oem option for preassembled axles and the cost is prohibitive for buying all the parts separately.