ttz

Summary: Bad design

It didn't start too good right form the beginning. I was a little bothered by the fact that they charge $173 for a simple mount. "Half the price of the pfadt mount" the claim. While true, what you get from pfadt is a nice professional grade piece that's a true brace made of nice anodized aluminum that is well thought out and designed. What you get from Hinson is exactly whats pictured. A simple poly cast mount. $173 for that is out of line in my opinion. Definitely an example of corvette tax if you as me. Then to add insult to injury, they charge $17 to ship this little thing. What I received looked to be very poor quality casting. There were bubbles scene on the top section of it and overcast of poly over parts of the metal body. No QC going on here.

So on to the install. Taking off the stock mount wasn't too bad for me since I already had the car on jack stands, exhaust off, sway bar out of the way, and suspension disconnected. There are 2 bolts that hold the top plate of the mount to the diff. Those had to come off first which wasn't super easy due to space constraints, but by no means was the hardest thing to do, just a little tricky. Then the bottom 2 bolts come off that go into the rear cradle. Easy. Next I needed to jack up the diff/tranny as high as I could. I got about 1/2" or so of room from that. Then the 4 main nuts that mount the rear cradle to the frame had to be loosened ad much as poss to drop the cradle a little. This gained about another 1/2". Now you need to try and wiggle the old mount out. Not to bad, you just need to pull some brake lines up a little. Stock mount out, then just pull the top plate off it and mount to the new one. This is again where quality comes a concern for the Hinson mount.

The studs that come on the Hinson mount are HUGE. Way too long. After bolting the top plate to it, I think I ended up cutting about 1" off the top studs to get it back down to where the stock one was. Then there's the bottom studs, also too long. I cut about 1/4" off those to make it overall the same size as stock so it would even fit. Without cutting them, there no way you're going to make it fit aside from completely taking off and dropping the rear subframe. Why Hinson wouldn't have used the same length studs as stock is beyond me, but what this in-turn means to you is that you're either going to being paying more to have it installed, or you're going to need tools/time to cut this thing down to where it should be had it been designed properly. Now that it resembles the stock one in size, time to put it on.

I snake it past the brake lines and struggle to get it aligned only to find out that the Hinson studs are too close together and won't fit though the stock holes in the rear cradle. Nice job again, Hinson. Trying to spread the studs had no effect. So now I need pull this thing back out and get a diegrider. After enlarging the slits/holes on the rear subframe so they are now slightly closer together its time to do it all over again. Mount finally in.

Bolt everything back up and call it a day. All in all, took me about 1.5hrs to do. Now having said that, they car was already on jack stands and about 3/4 disassembled. Had this thing been designed properly it prob would have taken 15min for me. Figure a few hours for anyone else since you'd have to take it apart from stock form.

I've yet to drive it and test and won't until spring, but all in all, its one POORLY designed and overpriced piece of plastic and metal in my opinion. Sorry Hinson, but that my opinion. Anyone planning on installing one, be prepared, you're going to be cutting the studs down and drilling larger holes in your subframe.

_r2h

You are the first negative response I've seen from these.

Have you per chance installed a set of pfadt mounts?

NukeC5

I have the Pfadt tranny mount installed. I had a much easier time than you it sounds like, but I did want to point out that I did have to drill out the cradle holes a little to get the bolts of the new mounts to go through. I dont know why its so hard for aftermarket companies to get this sort of thing right, but that was my only set back. The Pfadt brace looks cool at least ! And I did notice several advantages with it , I hope the same can be said for the Hinson mount for you OP.

RonSSNova

I installed my Hinson when I replaced the trans and diff, so the car was all apart. It bolted in no issues.

I too was unimpressed with the thing for the cost. But it fit.

You must have gotten a dud.

Ron

kawizzr14

I too am looking into a PFADT setup. I am looking at the Drag package, the motor mounts and the tranny brace. How did it do reducing the wheel hop? Looks sweet under your car btw

SteveDoten

Sounds like you are aggravated by the install.

I've removed the other brand for the Hinsons, installed quite a few sets in recent years, they are loved by many C5/6 owners.

JoeyG

My pfadt went right in with no issues, when they were first released. I just noticed the driveline seemed more connected to the car/chassis by noise and feel.

NukeC5

It does well from what I can tell. But the real test will be at the track next week when I try out my new drag radials. The install was easy enough, and another surprising benefit is in the handling! The car is much tighter around turns. I have the engine mounts too, but haven't installed them yet. Cant wait to see what the complete package feels like.

kawizzr14

Right on man. Rawk.

0tom01ss

i have the vbp diff monunt not issue.

ttz

I'm not aggravated by the install by any means. It was pretty easy for me since I had almost everything apart anyways. What I am aggravated about is the quality of the piece. When you pay almost $200 for something that would cost $60 for any other car, you would expect it to fit perfectly. Instead I have to cut all 4 studs down and drill out my cradle since it wasn't designed properly. Then the other quality issues on top of that like bubbles in the resin and over-casting.

1999_TRC

So you had the chance to evaluate the quality before install, determined it did not meet your expectations, and you installed it anyway. Not only did you install it, you had to modify your factory cradle, and modify the mount from Hinson(rendering it un-returnable).

So on the surface, one might think Hinson is the problem, but in reality, people like you are the problem. There is no incentive for suppliers to provide quality, fit, etc, if guys are willing to butcher their cars, to make parts fit.

NukeC5

Like I mentioned, I had to boar out the holes in the cradle to fit the Pfadt mount as well. I can understand the frustration.

Rookieracer

So let me get this straight. Hinson makes a cheesy product, ttz reports on what he had to do to make it fit, thus informing the membership here of what they are in for should they decide to purchase the lower cost option of the available products in this category.

And in your tiny little mind ttz is the problem?

One would think Hinson might have installed one of their production products on an actual vehicle.

I'm really having trouble following this type of pretzel logic.

_r2h

I'm confused as to what you were expecting mounts to be? The OEMS are studs, hunks of rubber and some makes put fluid in the middle.

What kind of voodoo magic did you expect an aftermarket part to be? It's interlocking rings, studs and poured poly, pretty fricken simple.

Little bubbles in the mold isn't gonna hurt anything. Custom set I made for a ford five hundred has a ton, works great with no issue. I can see where the stud length and diameter could be frustrating, but I think it's a fairly small issue.

SteveDoten

I've never had to enlarge the cradle holes with any of the non OEM mounts

WKMCD

Hey Steve,

I ran the "other brand" and took it back out after about 100 miles. Too much vibration transmitted which I am sure the reason you removed them. How are the Hinson in that regard?

Kevin

123sugey

Post some pics of the newly installed Hinson mount.
I had to enlarge the holes when I installed my Pfadt

IRON MAIDEN

Is your car a track or DD? Do you have opinions on the Pfadt?

Mr. Jones

I installed the Pfadt trans/diff mount about two years ago.
No install issues here. Only slightly more vib. My car is mostly a DD with some hard street fun and about 600hp on NOS.
No wheel hop and when I have a long drawn out wheel spin at speed and start to get that floating feeling at the rear of the car it comes right back in line when you soft pedal it, gets the heart rate up