Del-Sphere Pivot Flex Joint – 2.5″ o.d. x 0.325″ wall – 30º of Articulation

Price: 45.00 USD

Dimension Specifications: This Del-Sphere™ pivot joint is for custom built applications and is a weld on end, so welding is required.

The width of the housing is 1.50″, the diameter of the housing is 2.50″, the width of the spherical ball is 1.3425″ and has a 0.75″ through hole. The housing has a 0.325″ wall thickness and is CNC machined from 1020 mild steel and may be MIG or TIG welded.

You can bush down the ball’s through hole to match your bolt size and utilize spacers on each side of the ball to mount these Del-Sphere™ pivot joints on any application. The Del-Sphere™ pivot joint comes complete with a grease fitting and Allen wrench.

These extreme duty weld on Del-Sphere™ pivot joints are perfect for off-road 4×4 buggy, truck, Jeep® or rock crawler projects! They will work equally as well on performance vehicle handling applications.

The suspension bushings on your vehicle have a significant impact on your vehicle’s ride, comfort, handling, acceleration, noise and vibration. When the vehicle leans (rolls), one side of the chassis moves up relative to the rear axle and the other side moves down.

The suspension’s arms must twist to allow for the axle housing to articulate, this causes the bushings to bind. If this bind becomes excessive, it will raise the wheel rate and produce sudden and uncontrolled changes in handling such as snap oversteer.

The factory minimizes this suspension bind by using compliant rubber bushings. These soft bushings help accommodate the necessary motion of the suspension’s arms during articulation. However, the rubber bushings do not provide much in the way of forward and aft support which can cause wheel hop during hard acceleration and braking.

It is common to replace the stock rubber bushings with polyurethane bushings to resolve the shortcomings of the factory’s soft rubber bushings. Polyurethane bushings eliminate wheel hop, reduce axle deflection, and improve straight line traction. However, the downside of polyurethane bushings is they prevent the necessary movement of the suspension’s arms during body roll, which in turn produces significant binding in the suspension when the vehicle is articulating.

The polyurethane bushings also place high stresses on the suspension arm mounts on the vehicle. Polyurethane bushed suspension arms do not allow for rotation of the arm during articulation because of the stiffness of the bushings.

Del-Sphere™ Pivot Joints:

The Spohn Performance Del-Sphere™ pivot joint solves the shortcomings of the factory rubber and aftermarket polyurethane bushings. Our Del-Sphere™ pivot joint incorporates a spherical ball which is surrounded by Delrin® bushing cups.

This combination allows the suspension arm to articulate like a spherical rod end (30 degrees of available rotation) during cornering but the spherical ball does not allow the bushing to deflect. Therefore the suspension arm remains completely bind free.

Think of the Del-Sphere™ pivot joint as a Delrin® bushed spherical rod end. After over a year of R&D testing here at Spohn Performance on a streetable spherical joint the Del-Sphere™ pivot joint is the final result. Designed and manufactured exclusively by Spohn Performance, we have taken street and off-road suspension performance to the next level.

This Del-Sphere™ pivot joint features a massive 0.325″ wall DOM cartridge that houses self lubricating Delrin® bushing cups, a precision ground and hard chrome plated 52100 heat treated bearing steel spherical ball, a heat treated and zinc plated chrome moly threaded adjuster ring and an external grease fitting.

Our Del-Sphere™ pivot joints are fully rebuildable and adjustable. You can completely disassemble the Del-Sphere™ pivot joint for cleaning, inspection, etc. You can also adjust the amount of friction on the spherical ball, the amount of tension can be easily adjusted by using our optional adjustment tool to tighten or loosen the threaded adjuster ring. The threaded adjuster ring is then locked in place by a set screw.

What that means is if over time, miles and abuse the tolerances open up you can simply tighten down the threaded adjuster ring and have your pivot joint as tight as it was the day it was brand new. We doubt you’ll ever need to replace the Delrin® bushing cups, but they certainly can be. Unlike a rubber bushing or spherical rod end, the Del-Sphere™ pivot joints are 100% rebuildable at a very low cost.

What is Delrin®, and why did you choose to use it? Delrin® is an acetal homopolymer made by DuPont. It is characterized as having an excellent combination of physical properties that make it suitable for numerous applications.

With extremely low moisture absorption and a low coefficient of friction (self-lubricating), Delrin® is uniquely tailored for wear applications in high humidity or moisture environments. Delrin® will maintain constant physical properties under high moisture conditions and out-perform nylon or polyurethane under these conditions. Delrin® has a 10,000 psi tensile strength and a 120 Rockwell Hardness rating making it ideal for our Del-Sphere™ application.

Adjustment Tool: Del-Sphere™ pivot joint adjustment tool. You can purchase this tool by searching for Part# DS34-W in our eBay Store.