Homemade Idler Arm Brace

Redneck92 · Feb 8, 2014

Hey guys,

I would like to show you my Idler Arm Brace I made today.

I´s made from 5mm thick high grade steel for heavy duty applications.
In germany the steel is called S355 or St52
( I don´tknow the american name for it)

Here are some pictures of it aswell as from the welds.

I´m going to sand blast it and paint or might powder coat it.

What do you guys think of it?

Greetings from Germany

10navst · Feb 8, 2014

Your pics aren't working...

grasshopper · Feb 8, 2014

Welcome Redneck92.
The first pic works when clicked on now.

I'm not a welder, but it looks good to me

bods · Feb 9, 2014

Talk about heavy duty..... Looks good to me, a bit cheaper than what some of the manufacturing companies want for them... How big is the mig you used? Was it a home job or did you have access to an industrial sized welder?

75 GRC · Feb 9, 2014

Brilliant welding job top-notch!!!
Have you got any spec sizes?????

Now that's what you call HEAVY DUTY.

YEP!GOT A V6 'BUT I LIKE TO CUSTOMISE.

Redneck92 · Feb 9, 2014

to bools: I have an industrial sized mig welder on my own. It´s capable to run up to 400 amps stable with an watercooled welding gun. I welded this at arround 100 to 120 amps with 1 mm G3SI1 wire.

to 75GRC: I used a picture of the calmini brace as how it should look like. I builded the brace arround the idler arm itself. Starting with the back plate. Messured out the holes drilled them and boltet the Idler arm to that plate. Then I cut out the side plate to the hightof the idler arm and spot weldet in an 90 degree angle to the backplate. Then I cut out the bottom plate. To mark the hole for the bottom plate I put some black paint on the bolt of the idler arm and pressed the bottom plate on it so I could see the exact position to drill the hole. After drilling, i boltet the bottom plate to the idlerarm and the nearly finished brace and spotwelded It all together. Then I unbolted the idler arm and welded everything together after checking angles. Then there was just a bit of grinding left to do. As I said, It was about an hour job.

The thing with the specs or measurements is, that I only had an used idler arm which im going to re-new straighten the bolt and upgrade with bronce bushings I will machine on my own at my workplace. So its best to specially fit the brace to the idler arm. This way you can ensure that everything fits together nice and snug and does the job it has to do.