What grease for OEM suspension bushings ??

[ischmitz]

My front suspension squeaks like a pig ever since I put the stiffer sway bar on. Drives me mad. I used wheel bearing grease to lube the sway bar bushings. Obviously that didn't work that well. For all I can tell I have the OEM black rubber bushings.

What grease should I use to get rid of that. I was thinking of pickung up some white Lithium grease at the local hardware store. Does that sound right?

Ingo

[ChrisBennet]

I thought grease was bad for rubber?
You sure it's the sway bar that's squeaking?
-Chris

[ruf-porsche]

Yep grease is bad for rubber bushing

You can use a special grease on polyurethane bushing to eliminate the squeak.

[Chuck Moreland]

Ingo

Is this a factory under-body sway bar with rubber bushes?

They aren't supposed to be lubricated. The solution is to install new sway bar bushings, if in fact that is the source of the noise. If you really want to lube them, use a silicone based grease.

You can try and isolate the sound by spraying wd-40 on the sway bar bushings and see if that makes quite. This is only temporary relief so consider it a diagnostic, not a fix.

[Chuck Moreland]

.

[Tyson Schmidt]

Ingo, are your front control arm bushings stock? If so, then it's probably the front torsion bars rubbing on the inside of the control arm.

As the bushings sag, the torsion bar makes contact with the inside diameter of the longitudinal tube of the control arm. Putting in larger torsion bars makes rubbing even more likely, for obvious reasons.

[Randy Webb]

Chuck, Your 2nd comment was right on. And very succint.

[ischmitz]

Tyson,

that is a good point. I was wondering about that as well. I have sprayed stuff on about evrything else that could squeak to no avail. It woudl also explain the tire noise transferring so readily into high pitched body vibration during cornering. That vibration makes my electronic speedo needle bouce around.

I'll pull the bars this weekend, take a look at them for rub marks and then bite the bullet for new bushings. It's not the money but I am not looking forward to the install at all.

What would you recommend short of the bronze/needle bearing setup? Should I go with the Weltmeister Polycarbonate ones?
Our host seems to only offer one type while Weltmeister makes at least two different types for the A-arms.

Ingo

[JSDSKI]

Check out Chuck's parts - http://www.elephantracing.com Saw them at German Auto Fest and quality is excellent.

[Tyson Schmidt]

Well, Chuck Moreland's latest iteration of bronze bushings are the shiznit.
But short of that, I'd recommend the Polygraphite street-hardness bushings.

The hard plastic bushings are crap. IMO.

[surflvr911sc]

I think the street hardness is what Pelican sells. Might be a little premature and I hate to do it, but...

Told you so!

Ingo, give me a call tomorrow.

[Neilk]

Ingo,

I bought the poly bushings from Pelican. I never got to renewing my front suspension, so if you want them (at a discount) PM me.

However, if I get around to redoing the front suspension, I will get Chuck's bushings.

[Randy Webb]

Actually, you prob. need to replace all the rubber in every part of the suspension -- and the brake hoses. Old rubber get hard and stiff.

[ChrisBennet]

My hunch was squeaking torsion bars but why would a stiffer sway bar make the torsion bars rub?
-Chris

[sammyg2]

If it is actually the rubber bushings and not something rubbing, I'd recomend a silicon based lubricant like dow-corning 111 grease. Good stuff and won't hurt the rubber.

[Tyson Schmidt]

Originally posted by ChrisBennet
My hunch was squeaking torsion bars but why would a stiffer sway bar make the torsion bars rub?
-Chris

Good point. I thought he put in stiffer torsion bars. Must've been his thick German accent. I still think it's the torsion bars rubbing, but it's just a coincidence that it happened after the swaybar was installed.

[ischmitz]

Tyson, screw you, too.

The stiffer sway bar and the torsion bars went in at about the same time. A couple of weeks apart. All of a sudden this funny vibration started to occur. It was when we came back from the Solvang stomp. Stiffer sway bar but stock T-bars. I took a look at my steering rack cover plate and noticed that this bend piece of crap was touching the sway bar. After I took a big hammer to it I thought I had it fixed. Nada.

Then came the new tires and the stiffer front T-bars. The vibration was still there. And the horrible squeak. This time I thought it came from the outer thread pattern just barely touching the road surface when runing in a straight line. When I had the car in the alignment shop the guy went at at with one of them medical doctor listening things, suspected the ball joints, lubed them and did not fix the squeak.

I can't count how many times I had part of the front suspension appart by now. Since the squeak only happens when the car is on the ground that supports Tyson's therory of the front A-arm bushings having flowed and allowing the bigger T-bars to make contact under load.

is

[Chuck Moreland]

Yup. You didn't mention the new tbars earlier.

Your 29 year old control arm bushings are toast. The larger tbars put it over the edge and now they rub. That is almost surely the problem. Pull out the tbars and you'll see the scraped off paint!

[ischmitz]

It's done. Like Tyson and Chuck expected the A arm bushings where the cause. The rear ones (close the ride height adjustment) had flowed quite a bit and allowed the bigger t-bars to rub on the A arms. It took me some name calling and the better of two hours to get the old rubber bushings off. Maybe I should have used a torch. Everything went back together with white lithium grease on the bushings and wheel bearing grease (as rust protection) on the t-bars and the nasty sqeaking was gone. I even installed factory t-bar seals.

is (ready to kick some...) on the next run

[Jdub]

Great news!

I am considering Chuck's front bushing setup just to save me the agony of trying to stuff Smart Racing's "OEM" rubber bushings back in there. JohnW advised me that the difference between trading old rubber for new rubber is next to nothing. I really do not want to go poly.

John