My guess is increase part cost but reduce repair labor. Similar to replacing transmission or engine today. Not worth it for a shop to usually do the repairs them selves but replace the whole unit and send off to a remanufacturing plant
The frame is a much smaller portion of the vehicle than these cast parts.
Once a frame is damaged the vehicle often gets totalled out because it would be so much to replace, basically disassemble the vehicle or try to repair the frame and have poor safety risks from then on.
These casts are a lot more than where a frame is. Damage to the casts will happen from accidents that never would have damaged a normal frame.
The problem is that you’d have to pretty much disassemble half the vehicle to replace a cast part, and that will be thousands extra in labor.
Considering that the cast part is practically half the vehicle, I wonder if it is easier to change out the cast vs several frame parts.
My guess is increase part cost but reduce repair labor. Similar to replacing transmission or engine today. Not worth it for a shop to usually do the repairs them selves but replace the whole unit and send off to a remanufacturing plant
The frame is a much smaller portion of the vehicle than these cast parts.
Once a frame is damaged the vehicle often gets totalled out because it would be so much to replace, basically disassemble the vehicle or try to repair the frame and have poor safety risks from then on.
These casts are a lot more than where a frame is. Damage to the casts will happen from accidents that never would have damaged a normal frame.
Not on a unibody.