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After going through a roundabout in the wet, car decided not to turn and go straight into a gutter..
Bent the rim a little, wheel doesn't like to turn, and from what I could see in the dark, the lower control arm? seemed to be pretty banged up..

What kind of damage would I be looking at?.. Pretty pissed off and upset right now.. I had a feeling something bad was going to happen when I went for that drive as well

Managed to slowly drive my car back to my mates house at 10km/h with my hazards on, thanks to all the people that drove past me when I was trying to flag them down.. oh and to the wonderful police officers that drove past me slowly as I was signalling them to help me. Going to get my car towed back to my house tomorrow.

Sorry to hear about this.

Lower control arm is toast. They are SUPER fragile, designed to bend first and sacrifice themselves to save other parts from damage in a light impact. Without pics, tough to say what else is gone. If you hit really hard, you could be looking at bent crossmember / chassis - but I hope not for your sake

It might be hard to tell from that photo, but the lower control arm is bent pretty badly, from what I could see, everything else seemed to be intact.

Word of advice. You don't want the police to stop as they will more than likely fine you for 'not being in control of a vehicle' (couple of hundred bucks) or charge you with Reckless Driving (Court and a couple of hundred bucks).
Any single car accident gets this sort of treatment.

x2. They just get a free boost to their daily booking quota without doing much work or adding any value.

Hope it's not too serious.

Can't see pics...?

jerdes wrote:After going through a roundabout in the wet, car decided not to turn and go straight into a gutter...

Reckon you need to get a car that makes better decisions...

Sorry guys, had a little trouble uploading photos, but here they are.

Yeah I thought about that, cops fining me for reckless driving.. I guess it's a little lucky they drove past me.

Buy a second hand control arm, install and see if you can align it straight again. You will obviously need to repair the wheel too.

If you are interested in doing it right, change your front shocks and control arm bushes at the same time for offset bushes.

If alignment is not possible, you have a bent crossmember and/or chassis.

also maybe check the tyre tread.

hard to see if it's angle or not, but that tyre looks like it's getting close to the wear indicator.


possibly a contributing factor to the accident happening in the first place.

zossy1 wrote:Buy a second hand control arm, install and see if you can align it straight again. You will obviously need to repair the wheel too.

If you are interested in doing it right, change your front shocks and control arm bushes at the same time for offset bushes.

If alignment is not possible, you have a bent crossmember and/or chassis.

I have found a second hand lower control arm, going to try attempt to swap that out.

What do you mean by offset bushes?

hks_kansei wrote:also maybe check the tyre tread.

hard to see if it's angle or not, but that tyre looks like it's getting close to the wear indicator.


possibly a contributing factor to the accident happening in the first place.

The tyres are all still in really good condition, except for that one tyre on the damaged rim, as when I was driving it back, it was rubbing badly on the inner guard.

Thanks for all the replies, I'll keep you's informed, hopefully everything lines up with this control arm.

You will obviously need to repair the wheel too.

Only if they are top quality wheels. If they are cheap chinese wheels don't bother

Offset bushes are bushes with the mounting hole in the bush off centre.

They give a great deal more adjustability, especially in camber.

If you can't align the car back to something approaching reasonable specs with offset bushes, you will have no chance relying on the stock adjustment.

One more thing: once you have it back together and aligned, measure wheelbase (hub to hub) on both sides and compare. Fingers crossed it all measures up - good luck!

PS. you did well to find a secondhand lower arm so quickly

After a new lower control arm, new wheel and an alignment, the car is now back to being dríven!
Also bought a mx5mania cai tonight, hoping to install it real soon, can't wait.

Congrats, glad to hear it