Spring plate bushings

[rcaradimos]

Pic taken from imcarther post on subject.

Q: for those that have taken off the spring plates to replace bushings, were the inside of spring plate bushings as bad as the outer side?
The pic looks like the outer side is distorted more then the inside.
What have you guy's found?
Thanks
Bob

[jevvy]

Mine looked virtually exactly like that after 130k miles and were pretty similar on the inside and outside.

[charleskieffner]

ditto after 111k miles. felt strange ass end movement on downhill twisty at about 110mph. thats when we became suspect. now as always we trashed the stock ones and replaced w/sway away adj and poly razz ma tazz bushings. problem solved! and of course hollow torsions.............on and on it goes! some day entire car will be new again! LOL!

[KNS]

Mine looked like that too. When I replaced them (with Poly Bronze) a deep creak/ groan that came from the rear end when going over larger bumps went away.

[rcaradimos]

ZOANAS
Bay Area Pelican

Registered: Feb 2003
Location: Livermore, CA
Posts: 2010
Use long bolts and the TB cover to press the bushings in. Then remove the long bolts and replace with the correct length. Worked like a charm for me.


__________________
1988 Venetian Blue Carrera Coupe (Daily Driver)
Tin Can Sailor (I flushed more sea water than you ever saw, brownshoe.)


ZOANAS, THANKS!!!
This is the best tip on the installation of the spring plate covers or you can fight with them like I did on the drivers side for a couple of hours or use the longer bolts and be done in a half hour.

Guy's thanks for posting. Replacing the bushings was not in the cards for me at this point, but I wanted to get an idea of the ware since I was close to metal to metal on the TB cover and Spring plate cover.
What I chose to do as a temporary fix, I removed the spring plate cover and added some heater hose on the top of bushing (one inch hose split and wrapped over top, most worn area of bushing) just about the same thickness of worn bushing, cleaned up rust on inside of spring plate cover, used ZOANAS method of spring plate cover installation. Results are good the TB is now centered in the spring plate cover. I'm sure that I will get many miles out of the fix without a metal to metal vibration or clunk till I decide on new TB and total rebuild of bushings.

[rcaradimos]

First pic: white is lithium grease around TB, distance is equal all around.
2nd: split heater hose
3rd: example how hose wraps around TB bushing
Hey should be a good temp. fix for some of the 80's cars till your ready to jump in all the way.
All the best,
Bob

[randywebb]

I'm confused - what did you do with the heater hose? You didn't substitute it for the bushing, did you??

[rcaradimos]

No, the ware on the bushing is mostly if not all on the top. The hose lays on top of the bushing, fill the gap. Look at the pic w/ the PVC pipe ( if pipe were the bushing add the hose to the top, reinstall spring plate cover.
Keep the length of hose to position, trim excess after SPC in on.

[rcaradimos]

I'm not an artist, hope this clarifies it a bit.

[rcaradimos]

[randywebb]

OK, I see.

But given the grunge & effort to R&R these things...

[Paul Ferradas]

Is something gonna jump out at me if i remove the spring plate cover? Are these torsion bars under a load of some sort?

[randywebb]

no - the load is the bar holding up the wheel (or the body of the car if the wheel is on the ground)

i.e. the load is radial, not axial

[HarryD]

Originally posted by rcaradimos
No, the ware on the bushing is mostly if not all on the top. The hose lays on top of the bushing, fill the gap. Look at the pic w/ the PVC pipe ( if pipe were the bushing add the hose to the top, reinstall spring plate cover.
Keep the length of hose to position, trim excess after SPC in on.

I am very confused. From my standpoint, you did this to save the cost of a $65.00 set of Neatrix replacement bushings. You still needed to R&R the parts and pay (or perform) an alignment. Most of the cost is in the labor (yours or the shops). And now you will need to do it again. The addtional $65 seems like a low amount to being sure it is done right.

[Walt Fricke]

Harry - I think RC's thrifty temporary fix was just to the outer. So no alignment issues.

[HarryD]

Walt, if that is the case, then I can see that. But his first picture shows them removed. When you reinstall, how do you avoid the realignment.

[safe]

Originally posted by HarryD
But his first picture shows them removed.

Not his springplates.

Pic taken from imcarther post on subject.

[75Carrera]

Opps! My answer was posted as a new post... Sorry... it is titled as "I just did mine" Don't know how to move it here without reposting.

[75Carrera]

Originally posted by 75Carrera
Inners looked better than the outters but I replaced them both. After cutting with a very sharp knife, burning with a torch and sanding the hubs we used a waterproof lube and pressed the new ones on. Pounding the inner bushing into the body housing was a *****. Ploy-graphite bushings don'rt squeak and are 1/3 the price of poly bronze.
Took the opportunity to paint my spring plates and sway bars...

[Dixie]

...The hose lays on top of the bushing, fill the gap.

I'd install Netrix bushings before I resorted to stuffed heater hose under the outer retainer. I'd rather have new bushings and an alignment that was close over a kludge. (If you note the spring arm angle, and trace the outline of the spring arm on the trailing arm, you can get things back together pretty darn close to where they were to start with.)

Also worth mentioning… I just removed my two-year-old Netrix bushings. I was afraid two years of track time might have worn them out. They looked great! I was honestly sorry I went through the effort of removing them after I saw their condition.