Bushings!:)

[Mux213]

Hey Guys,

Okay I've been replacing a number of bushings so I'll do some posts here about it. I haven't done all the bushings and a number of times I have forgotten to take pictures.

First thing I did is the trailing arms. I had an extra set of the shorter ones, that made it easy because you can take your time. Doesn't take to much time but I wanted to sandblast and paint them. I haven't done that with a number of other parts, mainly cause they are to big or I dont have a spare to swap.

Anyways, first you need to take the old bushings out. The way I did it was to simply drill holes in the rubber, but a bolt in the bushing, and simply bash it out. Make sure you drill plenty of holes to get the bushing as loose as possible. If you have access to a press you can press the bushings out, but this is the poor mans solution

Once the old bushings are out putting the new bushings in is just a question of greesing them up, put both halves in (they should slide in nicely) and then out the metal insert in. I found that with these bushings I could push it in by hand and then put the whole thing in a vice to do the last bit and get everything to be in its place.

Putting them on the car proved to be a challenge, its hard to push them in place, they really are a tight fit. Officially you have to put them on when the axle is 'neutral'. When you raise the car the axle droppes bringing it out of this neutral position. If you tighten the trailing arms now and you then lower the car, the bushings will be stressed.

The way I did it was to raise the car, put some really large axle stands underneath the axle, and then lower the car making the axle suspend on the axle stands. This way I can still work on the car and have the axle in the right position. It doesn't make it to easy though since you dont have much room to work.

The end result is this: