Rear LCA's Boxed or Tubular?

[SYDEWAYZ71]

I'm about to purchase rear control arms for my 82 malibu but I'm not sure if I should buy tubular arms or boxed arms? What are the benifits of either style? Is there any difference in strenth? Right now I'm thinking of buying them from BMR (price is right) and I talked to some guys running BMR parts on their 4th gen F-body's and they are very happy. Its only gonna be street driven so I don't need anything adjustable.

[Norm Peterson]

If it really is only going to be street-driven, there isn't any structural need for closed-section LCA's on a G-body. They're mostly for big torque, deep gears, and strip-level grip, when you're about to pull the left front wheel on launch and you're getting noticeable roll to starboard. At that point the OE stuff does need help (mostly to prevent fatigue failure). For everything less severe, the OE parts are adequate, if not exactly pretty to look at. My EFI'd '79 (with a pretty short overall ratio in 1st) is still running (and is currently auto-x'ing as well) on the LCA's that came with the car after being in service for somewhere north of 150,000 miles.

Is there anything particular about your car that suggests that you do need something stronger back there?

Norm