ESMRace Spherical Review
Joined: Jan 2008
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Joined: Sep 2007
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I'm all for supporting the folks that put out good products and for giving companies a chance if things go awry because it happens, but ESM was REALLY bad. I made over 60+ documented calls to Canada, 60+ emails and finally gave up after many, many months and filed a claim with my credit card company for a refund and told them to send a label to get their stuff or it was getting binned (I didn't hear back of course, nor did the credit card company).
QUALITY-CONTROL:
I did get a chance to help a couple of people install their sets, have seen the tolerances and their quality firsthand compared to that of Hardrace (shock sphericals), Balade (shock sphericals and front large LCA sphericals) and Megan (for the spherical portion on their rear toe rod-- admittedly, this does not come in the ESM kit, but I was able to see their tolerance fitting with the toe rod spherical end). ESM uses a low-grade aluminum for their inserts that mars and deforms really easily and while it might hold for a while, steel would have been a better choice when it comes to manufacturing (one of the cars had ESM for a little over a year and although still functional, the marring of the soft material was apparent). A handful of the sphericals had slop within the machined housings and could not be used as the bearings which are fine, just rattle around. Some of the aluminum inserts that go inside the bearings themselves have too much slop once installed (where the bolts go through) and the suspension clunks around (I used multiple steel shims to pick up this slop on a couple of installs for people). A set of the front LCA sphericals were too small and could be pressed in by hand (and just falls right back out). The Hardrace and Balade ones clearly had tighter tolerances (by about half). Some of the inserts didn't fit in the kits (holes for bolts were too small and couldn't even be used), AP1 rear UCA sphericals were shipped instead of AP2 ones (different sizes), shock sphericals were never sent but they did send another set of AP1 UCA sphericals which amusingly didn't fit. General fitment across the same pieces are not consistent and this can be felt before install, but was slightly better after installing their product (maybe the soft aluminum deformed and made for a slightly better install fit?). Items were clearly not QC'd before getting shipped across the 4 full sets that I saw personally and this sentiment is echoed with a few other people on here. I have met a few people that run ESM sphericals on S2000s, but they did not really look at their kits to see if there was excessive slop before installing. For those that have installed or are about to install them, check for slop before torquing everything down. If you've installed spherical bushings before and have experience with this, you'll know what I mean.
SUMMARY:
I went off on a 4am rant here that's not even complete (like the ESM kits). You should cross ESM off of your list for both customer-service and quality reasons. They may have actually closed their doors as their Instagram page was stripped of content. The last time I checked, their page was still up and I think you can still pay them though. From what I saw in-person over the last 2 kits that we purchased from them, about 15% of their sphericals out-of-the-box could be used as-is, another 35% could be modified to fit with shims, and 50% were missing or initially incorrect altogether. If you have a set already installed, good luck and may it all work out. If you don't have money for spherical bushings and want to be race-readylike, go with poly-bushings. If you can pay a bit more for sphericals, use another company that's not called ESM.
Joined: Aug 2010
Posts: 75
Likes: 2
CUSTOMER SERVICE:
I'm all for supporting the folks that put out good products and for giving companies a chance if things go awry because it happens, but ESM was REALLY bad. I made over 60+ documented calls to Canada, 60+ emails and finally gave up after many, many months and filed a claim with my credit card company for a refund and told them to send a label to get their stuff or it was getting binned (I didn't hear back of course, nor did the credit card company).
QUALITY-CONTROL:
I did get a chance to help a couple of people install their sets, have seen the tolerances and their quality firsthand compared to that of Hardrace (shock sphericals), Balade (shock sphericals and front large LCA sphericals) and Megan (for the spherical portion on their rear toe rod-- admittedly, this does not come in the ESM kit, but I was able to see their tolerance fitting with the toe rod spherical end). ESM uses a low-grade aluminum for their inserts that mars and deforms really easily and while it might hold for a while, steel would have been a better choice when it comes to manufacturing (one of the cars had ESM for a little over a year and although still functional, the marring of the soft material was apparent). A handful of the sphericals had slop within the machined housings and could not be used as the bearings which are fine, just rattle around. Some of the aluminum inserts that go inside the bearings themselves have too much slop once installed (where the bolts go through) and the suspension clunks around (I used multiple steel shims to pick up this slop on a couple of installs for people). A set of the front LCA sphericals were too small and could be pressed in by hand (and just falls right back out). The Hardrace and Balade ones clearly had tighter tolerances (by about half). Some of the inserts didn't fit in the kits (holes for bolts were too small and couldn't even be used), AP1 rear UCA sphericals were shipped instead of AP2 ones (different sizes), shock sphericals were never sent but they did send another set of AP1 UCA sphericals which amusingly didn't fit. General fitment across the same pieces are not consistent and this can be felt before install, but was slightly better after installing their product (maybe the soft aluminum deformed and made for a slightly better install fit?). Items were clearly not QC'd before getting shipped across the 4 full sets that I saw personally and this sentiment is echoed with a few other people on here. I have met a few people that run ESM sphericals on S2000s, but they did not really look at their kits to see if there was excessive slop before installing. For those that have installed or are about to install them, check for slop before torquing everything down. If you've installed spherical bushings before and have experience with this, you'll know what I mean.
SUMMARY:
I went off on a 4am rant here that's not even complete (like the ESM kits). You should cross ESM off of your list for both customer-service and quality reasons. They may have actually closed their doors as their Instagram page was stripped of content. The last time I checked, their page was still up and I think you can still pay them though. From what I saw in-person over the last 2 kits that we purchased from them, about 15% of their sphericals out-of-the-box could be used as-is, another 35% could be modified to fit with shims, and 50% were missing or initially incorrect altogether. If you have a set already installed, good luck and may it all work out. If you don't have money for spherical bushings and want to be race-readylike, go with poly-bushings. If you can pay a bit more for sphericals, use another company that's not called ESM.
I'm all for supporting the folks that put out good products and for giving companies a chance if things go awry because it happens, but ESM was REALLY bad. I made over 60+ documented calls to Canada, 60+ emails and finally gave up after many, many months and filed a claim with my credit card company for a refund and told them to send a label to get their stuff or it was getting binned (I didn't hear back of course, nor did the credit card company).
QUALITY-CONTROL:
I did get a chance to help a couple of people install their sets, have seen the tolerances and their quality firsthand compared to that of Hardrace (shock sphericals), Balade (shock sphericals and front large LCA sphericals) and Megan (for the spherical portion on their rear toe rod-- admittedly, this does not come in the ESM kit, but I was able to see their tolerance fitting with the toe rod spherical end). ESM uses a low-grade aluminum for their inserts that mars and deforms really easily and while it might hold for a while, steel would have been a better choice when it comes to manufacturing (one of the cars had ESM for a little over a year and although still functional, the marring of the soft material was apparent). A handful of the sphericals had slop within the machined housings and could not be used as the bearings which are fine, just rattle around. Some of the aluminum inserts that go inside the bearings themselves have too much slop once installed (where the bolts go through) and the suspension clunks around (I used multiple steel shims to pick up this slop on a couple of installs for people). A set of the front LCA sphericals were too small and could be pressed in by hand (and just falls right back out). The Hardrace and Balade ones clearly had tighter tolerances (by about half). Some of the inserts didn't fit in the kits (holes for bolts were too small and couldn't even be used), AP1 rear UCA sphericals were shipped instead of AP2 ones (different sizes), shock sphericals were never sent but they did send another set of AP1 UCA sphericals which amusingly didn't fit. General fitment across the same pieces are not consistent and this can be felt before install, but was slightly better after installing their product (maybe the soft aluminum deformed and made for a slightly better install fit?). Items were clearly not QC'd before getting shipped across the 4 full sets that I saw personally and this sentiment is echoed with a few other people on here. I have met a few people that run ESM sphericals on S2000s, but they did not really look at their kits to see if there was excessive slop before installing. For those that have installed or are about to install them, check for slop before torquing everything down. If you've installed spherical bushings before and have experience with this, you'll know what I mean.
SUMMARY:
I went off on a 4am rant here that's not even complete (like the ESM kits). You should cross ESM off of your list for both customer-service and quality reasons. They may have actually closed their doors as their Instagram page was stripped of content. The last time I checked, their page was still up and I think you can still pay them though. From what I saw in-person over the last 2 kits that we purchased from them, about 15% of their sphericals out-of-the-box could be used as-is, another 35% could be modified to fit with shims, and 50% were missing or initially incorrect altogether. If you have a set already installed, good luck and may it all work out. If you don't have money for spherical bushings and want to be race-readylike, go with poly-bushings. If you can pay a bit more for sphericals, use another company that's not called ESM.
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alexrobinson202
UK & Ireland S2000 Community
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Jun 1, 2018 09:23 AM