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Bushing joints vs heim joints

7K views 4 replies 3 participants last post by  CrazyLarry 
#1 · (Edited)
Traditional rubber joints are seen on almost every Jeep. Rock Krawler has there heim joint style arms. Traditional joints act as a torsion type movement while heims seem to float and not bind up during moment. If heims are able to move without that torsion affect will they give a smoother ride. I have a Teraflex tracbar and all rubber type bushings and have a stiff/firm ride. Trying to smooth out ride by possibly changing to heim joint arms and tracbar.
 
#2 ·
Quite the opposite, a heim style joint will actually make your ride harsher. The bind of an OEM joint is completely irrelevant to ride quality, it can just be a problem for extreme travel suspensions as the bind will restrict movement and wear out the joints real quick.

A rubber OEM style joint is the most forgiving to vibrations and harsh feelings and generally results in the best ride quality. The worst for harshness is a metal-on-metal true heim joint like you'd get from Ruff Stuff (just an example, many companies sell them). These are usually reserved for hard-core off-road builds where strength and longevity during repeated hard impacts is the optimization. Something like a Johnny Joint or the Rock Krawler end you mention will be somewhere in between as they're not a metal on metal heim, they have poly races inside so there's some give between the two metal bodies to absorb vibrations.
 
#3 ·
I didn't realize that that rubber is helping with vibrations. Makes perfect sense. So a Johnny Joint is a hybrid of a heim and rubber bushing? I have head alot about them with reliably and strength but never understood exactly what they are and how they work. All my arms are synergy with the "Dual Durometer" I believe its a similar joint. Cant figure out why my rig is ridding rough. Im just throwing parts at it before I buy Super expensive shocks or worse, coilovers. I run EVO plush coils now 4"
 
#5 ·
Like Christensen was saying metal on metal rod ends are for strength and high misalignment for the harder stuff. Rubber bushings that come stock dampen quite nicely but when used for high articulation rigs will wear pretty fast. I use the synergy DDB bushings because of low maintenance and are a good compromise between the two above. I’ve replaced all my Johnny joints with these bushings
 
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