'98 Quattro 2.8 passenger side lower control arm BROKE where ball joint attaches. Fortunately, I was just pulling out of a driveway (10 mph), so damage was limited to slicing one of my brand new tires and wrinkling the fender lip edge. [the car dropped down onto the tire]. Car recently had an alignment; everything was tight. => Has anyone experienced this before? Now I'm wondering if I should do the driver's side??

 

Its pretty common to do CA's in 4's or pairs (ie both front wheels or both driver's side wheels, or all four at the same time). At the very least, you should do all the arms on a given corner when one of them starts to go. Not only is that a pretty good idea safety-wise, its usually cheaper in the long run. I elected to do them one at a time whenever they would start to squeak or clunk, and over the last 2 years its probably cost me well more than it would if i did them all at the same time.

As for experience, not personally. Though my buddy just had the same thing happen on his Lexus. Quite literally actually. His is still sitting on the tire in the driveway

EDIT: I also thought it would be worth cautioning you about buying control arms. Make sure you're buying the right thing. I say this because, in the front for example, there are upper and lower control arms, forward and rear position. Be sure to be specific when ordering so you get all the right parts. Its also recommended that you change the TRE's when you do the control arms.

 

For safety sake, I would bite the bullet and do the whole kit 'n kaboodle. It'll be a headache now, but will save you from chasing squeaks and clunks in the future. You can try to spend some time to find a shop willing to do the job, but if you are even moderately mechanically inclined, you should be able to accomplish this job yourself.

the Blauparts kit is
what I went with a year ago and I couldn't be happier!!

 

The odd thing is, the control arm broke right at the balljoint. I put a photo in my album if you want to check it out. Kind of puzzling WHY it broke. https://www.audiforums.com/forum/usercp.php

 

That link is to the User CP, this one is the picture:
https://www.audiforums.com/forum/alb...pictureid=7923

Thats wild man. Glad you weren't driving or anything though. Was it squeakin or clunkin or anything before it broke?

 

for how long u knew you had to replace control arms?

 

once I noticed one was squeaking/clunking/etc. i tried not to let it go longer than a month or two. ideally you should replace them ASAP but i was moving around a lot at the time and it wasn't feasible

 

Thanks for linking to the right photo, CCA4. I wish the CA had been sending out some warning signs; no noise, no play. I'm real glad it broke when it did; I generally drive the car quite a bit harder (it's running 2002 17" A4 wheels with 235 45 17's). The only thing I can think of is that ~ 1 month ago I had an alignment done (to go with the new tires). I wonder if the alignment shop banged on the CA at all...and maybe put a hairline crack in it that broke later??

 

any manufacturer's ID on the arm?

 

casting number is 1253269, and stambed in it is 5W6. No manufacturer ID.

Is anyone aware of any TSB's for this problem? (it'd be nice to get Audi to help pay for this).