Upgraded Suspension Bushings, front control arm and rear trailing/adjustment arm bushings Options

[hurley97]

A while ago I bought these Polyurethane bushings for the rear suspension and I finally got a chance to install them




You can get them on eBay here
or from Red Rocket Performance, or user RedRkt01 here on 6gc, mr2oc, or celicatech


We had installed the set for the front on Dustin's car a while back, link to thread here, and they made a huge difference. I wanted to do the rears first in my car to see the difference between just the fronts and just the rears. So I did.

They replace the bushings in both rear adjustment arms, trailing arms, and control arms. I brought the car to work and installed them with the help of one of the guys I work with. The job required the use of the press, vice, air hammer, torch, the air gun, and a few hand tools. Not really a job I could have done by myself outside in front of the house, might have been able to do it in Manny's garage but it would not have been easy and would have taken at least all day if not all weekend. It took us about 3-1/2 to 4 hrs to finish the job. And yes, you really need to do an alignment afterward.

I didn't really take good pictures during the process and all I have are crappy pictures of the finished product. Maybe I can get some better ones on my day off.












First Impressions:
I've only put about 150 miles on the car since the installation and most of it has been back and forth to work in traffic. I do have to say, these things are very bad for me. People already tell me I drive like a maniac and I'm usually the only person on the road who speeds up to take a corner, but now I just feel like I can go even faster all the time. I have gotten a little time with some corners and all I can think about is finding more corners and driving even faster around them. I actually got my front wheels to loose grip around a corner while the rear had not problem and just guided the car around. The car feels much more solid overall and, it might seem weird, but I feel like the steering is more precise.
I used to take 30mph curved exit ramps at 75-80mph and be scared, hovering my foot over the brake pedal just in case I needed it. Now, I have complete confidence in my 80mph exit ramp and speed up the whole way through. So far so good

(I really am not that much of a manic though... not all the time anyway)

This post has been edited by hurley97: May 31, 2011 - 5:25 PM

[jordisonjr]

Has anyone had issues with these wearing out fairly quickly?
I installed min July 2011 (by the looks of of it, from my posts in this thread) and last night discovered that on the driver side wheel, the bushing towards the back of the car has quite a bit of play, and is causing a huge clunking noise. You can actually see the wheel move forward and back within the wheel well while accelerating and stopping, and I can recreate the sound/movement by simply shaking the wheel front to back with my hands, with the cars weight on the wheels. And I'm pretty frustrated that these are worn already.

When I replaced them, I torched out the existing bushing (leaving the ring inside the arm) and brought it to a mechanic to press in the new bushing. I'm not sure if the ring was left in the arm, or taken out, but from the looks of it, everyone that's done these bushings have taken the ring out. I also did NOT use the OEM crush tube within the bushing as Tigawoods did, but it seems no one else did either. Could either of these two things cause extra movement in the arm or per-mature wear? Or were the bushings just installed wrong? Right now it seems the rear bushing is the only one moving, but I've yet to put the car in the air and inspect closer.

I did a quick visual inspection, and the bushing appears to be intact, and not cracked or torn, so I'm a little confused as to why this would be causing noise after about 3.5-4 summers of regular driving and no track use. Any insight would be great, as I'd like to avoid replacing these bushings again. And if they do need replacing already, I will probably be going back to OEM which, IIRC, cost about 500 CDN, and not something I'd really like to do either.