Mine will be on tommorrow with the sherical bearings.

It is on and good to go.

Solid??? Extremely.
Worth the cost??? You bet.

Kind of a pain but if you let the machinist know ahead of time they may be able to get it done in a day.

I will post every month or so to let you know how it is holding up on the crappy roads I drive daily.

Sooo, what the verdict after a month of testing??

Going good.. I have been on 3 what I would call real trips and beat it pretty good in that period and of course rough crappy dirt roads I am living on.

There was a bit of play but I just had to tighten the bolt up.

Going strong.

what's the major advantage to installing the idler arm? is it worth the problems everyone is seeming have?

Got my bearings from McMaster the other day. Hoping I can get them installed next week so I can finally get my truck aligned

Did Calmini fix the problem yet? I am running a PML and really wanted to add the full 3" with steering. Not liking the costs of the other systems. Calmini is affordable but I don't want to deal with the bushing issue.

The problem is being fixed, but I've been waiting for my system since the end of July. They claimed that they would be shiped by the second week in Sept, but that didn't happen.

I am not intending to start anything, but not everyone w/ Calmini SS is guranteed to have the problem. I don't know anyone in our club having the problem. The (1st gen.) system is on my truck for the last 40,000+ miles, and I have not had the problem, either.

I would like to know why some have the problem repeatedly, and there are others who don't at all, though... You know...identifying the true cause of the problem.

And, yes, I'm glad that there is a solution to those who keep having the bushing problem.

PaNissanX
Did they say what they are doing to fix the problem????

I ordered my steering and asked about the problem. Aside from the guy on the phone turning into a total dick when I asked he said the bushing was never bad. It was the housing of the bushing and that it is all fixed.

So does that mean the ones that the rest of us bought a few years ago were defective? They replaced mine 3 times and yet today I had to replace the bushings yet again. And yes, there was plenty of grease in there.

I have no idea... I guess we will see since I ordered the kit. I wasn't about to drop 1k into just steering. When I brought up the question to Calmini on the phone the sales rep got real defensive really quick. I told him I read the message boards and have seen NUMEROUS people having the same issue with the bushing. At this point he started to become snide with me saying how it wasn't the bushing. I asked him how that was possible with so many people posting with the problem. This is when I was told it was the "sleeve". I just said whatever and placed my order. I'm not about to argue with someone over the damn phone about this. At the same time though I don't want to drop more money into steering and Calmini seems to be a good quality other than the issues people were having. Guess I'll report back once it is installed.

I'm interested to see what they did to fix the problem. I really do believe that the rest of their steering system is far overbuilt but the idler arm did need some improvement. For an extra $150 to get the bearings and have the idler arm machined I still believe that you get a better product than anyone else offers.

I was sent new bushings twice and made sure that they stayed greased. The last set got sloppy after one weekend of wheeling. I gave up trying to put new ones in after that. Of coarse I think I may wheel my truck a little harder than the average person. I really do use my skidplates.



Axle

Axle, how do your LCAs look? Any tears along the shock mount welds?

I'm starting to develop the stress fractures where the shocks mount to the LCA's. Only on the passenger side now though because the drivers side LCA recently got replaced. My lower ball joint was about ready to rip out of the arm.

Axle

Shit the bed! I tell you man, I think they got a bad batch of metal there in '01... I'm beginning to wonder how much more mine'll take..

Yeah Im real Interested as to see what they came up with here. From your description of what they told you having a hard time seeing any change. I'd like to drop the $1500 on the system but am not gonna unless i can steer the damn thing reliably.

I had my LCA shock mounts welded up this week. The driver's side was cracked around the mount and had migrated down the side. The passenger's side wasn't so bad, just some cracking on one side of the mount. Unfortunately, I didn't take any before pictures, but you can use your imagination.

Driver's side:






Passenger side:





Troy

Thanks for the pics guys, I'm sure mine'll be up soon enough too, as I'm headed to my welders soon for some extensive work. I swear the way the sheetmetal's ripping on my rig, I'm tempted to keep my chassis/engine/drivetrain and make the first Nissan Calmini SAS XTERRA buggy Tear off all the sheetmetal, right down to the frame and than weld on a cage, and my roofrack

I'm really interested in finally doing this mod. I know someone with a Lathe that would help me out, but i'm not exactly sure what i'm supposed to tell him that i want done. Soo...could someone put this in layman's terms??

Are you enlarging the Diameter of the Bushing hole... or just making it deeper?

And as for the whole second part.. i am just confused.

That is just wrong.

With all the tears I have seen on the 2001 Xterra's I would be concerned if I owned one made in that year.

But what you have in that pic is just off the hook. Were you launching your Xterra on a regular basis or was that just from "normal" wheeling? What did the other side look like?

The damage is just from "normal" wheeling. Although I'm not really sure how much extra stress the rocks out on Cali put on the truck.

Axle

Any news on if Calmini is going to warranty or pro rate the older, defective idler arms?

Yep I just had my LCA Shock mounts welded yesterday, Both sides.

The Ball Joints are fine but DAMN insane!!