Rough Country X-Flex Adjustable Control Arms for 2 to 6-Inch Lift (07-18 Jeep Wrangler JK)

Video Review & Installation

I'm Ryan from ExtremeTerrain.com and this is my review of the Rough Country X-Flex Adjustable Control Arms fitting all 2007 to 2016 JKs. These are available in pairs or as a set of all eight. Anytime you lift your JK, you'll be moving the axles of the vehicle toward the center.A set of adjustable control arms will allow you to re-center the axles underneath the wheel wells. Adjustable control arms also have a couple of other benefits. When you lift a solid axle vehicle, you'll change the pinion angle and the caster angle in the front axle. Bad pinion angles can cause driveline vibrations and premature drive shaft wear, and a bad caster angle can cause a flighty feel while driving down the highway because the steering wheel doesn't want to re-center itself. A set of control arms like this are single adjustable, which helps to keep the cost down a little bit, and the fact that these are available as pairs allow you to build up to a full set over time, saving you a little bit of money. The first thing you'll notice when you take these control arms out of the box is how beefy they are, especially when you compare them to a factory control arm like this. These are really strong and that's exactly what you need, especially when you have big tires on your jeep and you're off-road abusing your suspension. The way these arms are designed is that they have a rubber bushing on one end, which is really similar to your factory bushing. and the other end is Rough Country's X-Flex spherical joint. These joints will provide you with 20 degrees of articulation on an upper control arm and 35 on a lower. What that means is that along with re-centering your axles, adjusting your pinion angle and adjusting your caster, these control arms are going to give you additional articulation and additional performance off-road.One of my favorite parts about the X-Flex joints is that they're completely rebuildable. Rough Country provides you with all the parts you need to rebuild those joints in the event that they do start to make a little bit of noise or get a little bit loose. Getting these control arms installed in the jeep is a pretty straightforward process. You actually follow many of the same steps that you would if you were installing a full lift kit.The first step is to support the jeep by the frame and remove or loosen anything that keeps the axles from completely drooping. That means you're going to be loosening or removing your brake line brackets, sway bar end links, track bars and shocks. Once you completely sagged the axles from underneath the jeep, you will be able to remove your springs, and the axles will be completely unloaded. At that point, you can just remove the bolts holding the factory control arms in place and install the new ones.Now because these are single adjustable control arms, you will have to adjust them with the jeep in this condition. You won't be able to put everything back together and ingest them on the jeep like you would with a double adjustable control arm. That does make installing a double adjustable a little bit easier, however these single adjustable arms are less expensive, so it's a good way to save a few dollars.This whole process can take place after you've installed the X-Flex joint in each of the control arms. Again that's a really simple process following Rough Country's installation instructions. And they even provide you with the tool necessary to install them. The whole process should take you about four hours if you're installing a full set of like eight control arms or a little bit less time if you're only installing a couple. And you won't need any specialty tools, just the jacks and jack stands and some traditional hand tools, although air tools will definitely speed up the process. Let me just say, I know what Rough Country's reputation was for control arms. In the past, they were known for not making the highest quality control arm and they were known for their joints wearing out prematurely, but I have to say these are not the control arms of the past.These X-Flex joints seem to be really strong, they are completely rebuildable, they seem really solid, and these control arms really seem like they're worth the price. There a lot of companies making control arms, and they all have their sort of proprietary spherical joints. They all say they're stronger than another one or provide more articulation than another one, but honestly, for the price you have to pay for these, these seem like a really nice adjustable control arm option.So if you've lifted your jeep and you're looking for a set of adjustable control arms to re-center the axles and the wheel wells, adjust your pinion angle and adjust your caster angle, these are a really nice set of control arms that are going to be both strong, rebuildable, and provide additional articulation over your stock arms. So that's my review of the Rough Country X-Flex Adjustable Control Arms fitting all 2007 to 2016 JKs. They can find right here at ExtremeTerrain.com.