UGH - Sway Bar Outer Bushing Replacement

[968 GUY]

When I said squeak, I actually mean grab and actually lose some of the effectiveness of the bushing. The bar should be able to rotate smoothly through the bushing, like a bearing.
Softer rubber actually deforms to accomplish this, but harder bushings such as poly and delrin need to be lubed.

[Gawernator]

Since you daily drive like I do, I suggest the OEM bushings! They're nice, last a while, quiet. Not hard to replace if needed. Inexpensive.

[pfarah]

I replaced mine this past summer with the standard bushings that PP offers. Why do you ask? Well, I don't race her and she tracks very well in stock trim, just as the good Dr. P. ordered. Since I repaired my power steering pump (best $20.00 ever spent), no leaks = no premature rubber degradation.

As for the caliper, any digital unit will work fine. Mitutoyo makes a very nice unit; I've had my set over 15 years with no issues.

[nutless_neo]

Does anyone know the actual measurements of the outer sway bar bushing? I know my inner diameter is 14mm and I think the outer diameter is 35mm. It's kinda hard to tell with the caliper I'm using, which looks like 30-31mm, so I used a ruler and it says 35mm. I can't measure the old bushing because it disappeared. So I'm measuring the bracket opening.

[Gawernator]

Use the part number off the bushing on the other side

[nutless_neo]

Originally Posted by Gawernator

Use the part number off the bushing on the other side

Yeah, I thought about that, but I was hoping to avoid taking the other bracket off. Having one side loose is bad enough And I just don't have enough time in the day to work on my car during the week. By the time I get home, it's dark and too cold to work. No, I don't have a garage.

[Gawernator]

The part number is on the 'sidewall' of the outside of the edge of the bushing, you should be able to see it without doing anything but walking up to it!

[nutless_neo]

Originally Posted by Gawernator

The part number is on the 'sidewall' of the outside of the edge of the bushing, you should be able to see it without doing anything but walking up to it!

Oh, I did not know that Thanks.

[Gawernator]

Yep I'm still not sure what size of sway bar was on my car, my bushings said 951.. at any rate I went up to 968 sways

[djnolan]

I have polyurethane stabilizer bushings front and rear from energy suspension on my ford explorer. They are 10 years old and still give the beast a solid and tight feel.

I stayed with oem rubber on both porsches and am happy. At the time I didn't think poly was a bad idea for the porsche but i wasn't able to find them. The 944 has a round recess in the control arm for the sway bar bushing instead of a flat surface. This my be the reason the harder bushings squeak.

[flash968]

where bushings squeak is usually at the center bushings as the sway bar rotates inside the bushing. rubber has some give to it, so it generally doesn't do that.

i've had quite a few polyurethane bushings squeak over the years. the only ones i've had success with had grease fittings.

delrin is supposed to be self lubricating, but the design of ours is such that they wear out in oblong fashion if they are not greased. this causes them to make noise, but the noise is more of a "knock" than a squeak. if you do grease them, then the bar moves left to right, unless you put some form of shaft collar on the sway bar, to prevent that.

all that said, there is not a lot of performance gain from non-rubber bushings. you get a little, but not nearly as much as the next size up sway bar, and you usually spend more on the bushings than finding a used sway bar, which often comes with its own bushings.

[nutless_neo]

Well considering the ***** of a time I am having finding any 14mm poly bushings for my sway bar, I just may have to go with rubber, which is just not what I want. Any part is going to have an upside and a downside, its just a matter of what you want and why. I do prefer polys because they last longer and wont fall apart at the first sign of grease, dirt or oil - which is why I'm having to replace my bushings in the first place. I also prefer polys for the stiffness and overall performance handling because I do drive my cars hard.

I contacted Pelican parts support about their poly bushing but they were no help at all. I'm tempted to just buy it anyway along with the rubber ones and just return the polys if they don't fit.

[flash968]

uh- fix the leak that is causing your problem with rubber bushings???

i just pulled a set of original 968 swaybars and bushings out of a car here. the bushings still looked great and were still supple. there is no reason that rubber would not serve you very well for a long time, as long as you don't have leaks. but then, you should not be driving the car with leaks anyway.

again, you would be far better off from a performance standpoint of replacing the sway bar with a larger one. the gain you get from bushing stiffness is very minimal. you can do the math, but you are looking at roughly 2-3% for poly, and maybe 5% for delrin. it's just not much. jumping up one size in swaybar is more like 20% per size.

[nutless_neo]

Originally Posted by flash968

uh- fix the leak that is causing your problem with rubber bushings???

i just pulled a set of original 968 swaybars and bushings out of a car here. the bushings still looked great and were still supple. there is no reason that rubber would not serve you very well for a long time, as long as you don't have leaks. but then, you should not be driving the car with leaks anyway.

again, you would be far better off from a performance standpoint of replacing the sway bar with a larger one. the gain you get from bushing stiffness is very minimal. you can do the math, but you are looking at roughly 2-3% for poly, and maybe 5% for delrin. it's just not much. jumping up one size in swaybar is more like 20% per size.

Yes well, I can't very well walk the 50 miles each way to work now, can I? One thing at a time my fellow Porschite. Given that I don't get home until it's dark out, freezing cold and I don't have a garage, well some things just have to wait til the weekend. Thankfully, it's not a horrendous leak, but a leak just the same. I'll be cleaning off that side of the undercarriage and engine this weekend and try and track it down. It looks to be coming from somewhere around the oil filter but not the filter itself, I don't think. There is no oil on top of the engine or on the side, just on the bottom. Believe me, I don't like the idea of leaking oil but there just aren't enough hours in the day.

As for a larger sway bar - that sounds like a good idea - but just not an expense I can incur at the moment. I just need to get this stupid bushing and be done with it. This is so ridiculous something so simple should be so hard.

[flash968]

take it to a shop and rent a car for a day. enterprise is cheap and delivers. for a couple hundred bucks, you're done, without injury, or any impact on your day.

this car is going to cost you money every year, and it won't get better as it gets older either. i would never depend on a porsche, especially an older one, as my only vehicle. that's just not smart. if this is an issue, you need a camry.

[nutless_neo]

Originally Posted by flash968

take it to a shop and rent a car for a day. enterprise is cheap and delivers. for a couple hundred bucks, you're done, without injury, or any impact on your day.

this car is going to cost you money every year, and it won't get better as it gets older either. i would never depend on a porsche, especially an older one, as my only vehicle. that's just not smart. if this is an issue, you need a camry.

Thanks for the advice, but I'm not getting a Camry lol or any other econobox. I see no problems in depending on my car for DD, it's served me well so far. Besides if it absolutely really came down to it and I couldn't drive it, I have 3 other vehicles to choose from, including my fav - my Ninja ZX6R it's just too damn cold to ride right now.

Plus you need a credit card to rent a car and I don't do credit cards. And I don't let anyone else work on my vehicles. Any car is going to cost money every year.

[AKCJ]

One of the sway bar end bushings was missing when I got my car. It had probably been that way for a year or two. After driving the car for a few months I finally got around to ordering one. It was a pain to put on - seemed like the bushing bore was just too small. Anyway, there's no reason to stress about it or rent another car because of it.

[nutless_neo]

Originally Posted by AKCJ

One of the sway bar end bushings was missing when I got my car. It had probably been that way for a year or two. After driving the car for a few months I finally got around to ordering one. It was a pain to put on - seemed like the bushing bore was just too small. Anyway, there's no reason to stress about it or rent another car because of it.

Agreed. It's been driving fine without it and I haven't noticed any difference in performance with it gone. It's not like I'm going to leave it like that but I like my car and prefer driving it over the other vehicle choices I have - a 1/2 pickup with a 350 or a KIA SUV - both of which suck up way more gas than my 944. Of course, I would much rather be riding my Ninja, but as I said, it's too cold for that - even with heated jacket and gloves.

[Gawernator]

I can attest that flash's bushings indeed work well!
It kinda sounds like you'd get poly bushings as a band-aid for not fixing an oil leak.

[nutless_neo]

Originally Posted by Gawernator

I can attest that flash's bushings indeed work well!
It kinda sounds like you'd get poly bushings as a band-aid for not fixing an oil leak.

uhh...hows that? I was planning on getting polys from the get go as I do with all my cars. The fact that the bushing fell off from being rotted by oil and dirt just put it closer to the top of my to do list. As I said earlier, I will be tracing and hopefully fixing the leak this weekend. The whole point of this thread was just to find out where I could get poly bushings for tiny sway bar. Apparently it's gone way beyond that, for whatever reason.