We made a family trip to an old mine in Death Valley where my wife's grand parents grew up. The trail there was bumpy but super simple. My control arm bracket broke leaving us stranded for some time. With no cell coverage, and knowing tow trucks wouldn't come down the trail we had to use some ratchet straps to hold everything in place in order to limp off the trail.
Wow, sorry to see that happen to you and glad that you were able to get off the trail safely. I think I'm going to give my brackets a look today.
Yeah we used two ratchet straps to stabilize everything. Once we got off the trail, we then called up a tow truck. We're currently on the hunt for a local welder to fix the bracket (think we have one lined up for tomorrow), which was hard since it's easter and all. The scary part, is that we drove out here to California to visit family and make the trip to death valley to the tiny settlement their grandparents grew up during the depression. We still have to make an 8 hour drive back to Tucson. Luckily I already took off Monday so I had a relax day when I got back, but my wife had to call in and let her work know she was going to be late. I'm going to give Daystar a call tomorrow to let them know about this. It seems like the design on this bracket just isn't quite there. This was a very simple trail that was done very slowly, since we were behind my sister-in-laws rental SUV.
When did you purchase the lift? I know there was a recall on parts manufactured at the end of last year...
Okay, I just spoke with Daystar and was told that they have started a recall on the original brackets. Apparently, some of you may have already been contacted and apologize for the delay in getting this out. I am told they are doing this through the NHTSA so it took longer than they would have preferred. They said that they are taking full responsibility for this issue. Hopefully they'll chime in with more info as it becomes available.
Ender, looking at the photo of your bracket, it looks like some of the welds sheared off from the base material, but also the stainless? steel failed. Any chance you could take a few more photos before you weld it back up to get home? Would be great if you could take a few close ups and post them here. And how does the bracket on the other side look like? It looks like you have a bracket with long welds along one side, from other posts this would have been a "no recall bracket"? I was getting close to buying the lift kit, now I am wondering whether Daystar will fix their design or whether they expect every buyer to find a welder and add more weld, knowing that by doing that you are significantly weakening the base material...
I called Daystar today and they said that any bracket that looks like EnderAZ's is not a recall bracket. Maybe it was a one in a million occurrence and Ender was the unlucky 1. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Well, I just got an email from the CEO of day star asking me to call him on his cell. It's currently busy, but this looks promising.
Glad to hear that you were able to make it off the trail and have now found a welder. Hope your drive home is uneventful.