A friend of mine claims her dad can Fab up anything. I told her to have him make me some A-arms if he is so good. Are there like blueprints out there or patters to work off if you wanted to build up some arms?

I heard something about jigs, that you had to have one to make an arm

Easiest way is to borrow a set of +2 (or whatever width you want) from a friend. make jigs out of those and build the new ones to fit the jig.

These were copied from a set of +2 Leager's:


This same guy also built a 2nd set but on the uppers he used the stock arms, cut the ball joint off, welded in a +2" tube and installed the BJ on the end of it. It's worked good for a few years now.

Does he sell em?

No he just needed a couple sets for his 250R's.

I have a friend in Mexico who builds race cars for the Baja Racers.

He built me a set of +2+1 A-arms and they have lasted 3 years now.
I know other people that got A-arms from him without a single complain.

$150 for a set from him compared to approx $450 from others.
The choice was easy for me then.

I bought a set of Leagers and he made a copy for $150.
Look the same, and work the same way.

I was there when a guy from Vegas was offering him a job in Vegas cause he was impressed with the kind of fabrications he's done.

He has a degree in Architecture and Mechanical Engineering and a passion for offroad. Perfect blend!!

I will see him this weekend.

I will let you know on Sunday when I get back.

These are a set of tig welded chromoly +2 +1 arms I fabricated a couple years ago for my TRX 250R. This was my first shot a building a set of a-arms. These use much larger ball joints with larger shafts, well actually tie rod ends from a mazda pickup, than most you'll find with the screw in type ball joints. Most of the manufacturers use vw tie rod ends, way too weak.



To do it right, so they fit and are identicle side to side, you definitly need a jig. This is the case for anything, chassis, swingarms etc, you always need a jig built for that particular item your fabricating. A jig is something that sets the location of the various mounting points and such as well as holds it all in place while your welding them together, for the most part anyway. When you weld you have to use a bit of a technique and plan for things like "draw" when the metal cools, meaning when it cools back down after welding, it's gonna contract and shrink like a mad dog so you have to plan for this the best you can or they will not bolt up correctly, if at all. This set actualy contracted a little more that I had planned for, not enough to cause a problem, but enough that I made a note of how much to account for the next time.

A jig is something you have to make yourself before you can build your arms, unless you buy one off of some shop shutting down or what ever. You can't go out and just buy one. I actually have more time in my jig then I do in actually fabricating my a-arms. You make a junk quickie jig, your gonna get junk a-arms.

I know a-arms look simple to build, but they really have more work in them than you think. Figure that virtually every single thing on them is unique, you can't buy it off any shelf. You have to fab it yourself, shock tabs, even down to the bushings. You have to account for things like clearence for the wheels from lock to lock, figure the correct angle of the ball joints and shock mounting is extremely critical. Miss one of these items and they're junk, start over. This took a tube bender, a tig welder, a lathe, a bandsaw etc etc. Another thing to consider is that chromoly is not cheap and you simply don't go down and buy it by the foot. You buy it in twenty foot lenghts, so maybe if your building 2 sets, it may be cost effective. The tops of those a-arms in my case are 7/8 and the bottoms are 1 inch, so there you have 20 ft of each size. Then there's the larger dia solid pieces the ball joints screw into. I had to buy a minimum length of I think 5 or so feet and pay a cut charge for the foot or so I actually needed. Oh and then there's the tie rods to factor in too.

If you go the heim joint route on the uppers at least, as I did, those ain't cheap either, not good ones anyway. It all adds up and the 450 or so they get for a-arms really turns out to be not too bad a deal for what you get, but there are a lot of clowns out there building junk. Most people find this out when they go to fit them up and have to grab a pry bar to get them on. Then there's the little issue of trusting your life to the fabricator of these arms. One part fails and you go down nasty. All these things are something to consider.

Hey Guy Chrest,

You are right on the money.

My friend told me he spent lots of time building the jig. And it doesn't pay to build the jig for one set of A-arms. He uses mig welding rather than tig simply because he thinks the tig process is too slow, the weld beads look better, but who actually looks at them?

I believe the only reason he is able to sell his A-arms at that low price is just because the labor in Mexico is much less than the labor cost in the US.

That's one reason why we pay top dollars for products made in the US, and the fact that there is the usual warranty that comes with them.

It seems you burnt the midnight oil making your own A-amrs, I bet that was rewarding, Would you do it again? Maybe not.....

Right on man...