As I said, I should have bought a lottery ticket as well.... 😁. In addition to the "luck" of actually taking spare rod ends, when I returned home and checked the remaining two rod ends in the packet of four I had bought from Demon Tweaks a couple of years ago, one was a LH thread instead of RH!
As for the differences between the Aurora XM-6 and the NMB ARHT6E(R), it's difficult to find the same comparison figures. I have seen tensile loads of 7180lbs for Aurora and 10900lbs for NMB but difficult to say if these are directly comparable. I asked Bill at Empire for his advice and he said that NMB are "the best" (they were Rose Bearings before NMB took them over), although not the cheapest. He said they don't fracture, just bend (in a crash).
I have got a set of four ARHT6E(R) rod end bearings and intend refitting the Empire kit over the Winter with them. I will probably remove them and check them again after 10,000 miles/ 2 years. Hopefully there will be nothing to report.
I do not know what was originally supplied by Empire/Krazy Horse. I asked Krazy Horse and they would only say that replacements are £30.66 each, I guess they are not even Aurora quality at that price (they are about £40+). The bonus of being "modest" quality is that the bearings will probably wear out before the rod end fractures, my original ones did. Bearing side play was excessive within 15,000 miles.
The chances are that this issue is with a particular Aurora bearing (or batch?), all the others on my car were fine. This is just to make owners aware that there could be a problem and have a check of the rod ends on the Empire kit, if you have one fitted. It's an "aviation" safety culture thing, hiding problems (however limited) is never a good thing, I am not trying to frighten people, just make them aware.
