Front suspension bush: how d'yer get it orf?

[marinabrian]

Originally Posted by MissMoppet

Ah but I did. This is the post I linked to in my very first post above. I would never have attempted it without reading Brian's instructions. I can only assume that Tynesiders are a good deal tougher than us Southern Softies . . .

Dave, have your glamorous assistant use a 17mm socket and bar on one of the wheel nuts, and with you under the car apply either tightening or slackening force to one of the wheel nuts.

This will force the arm one of two directions, allowing it into a position where the bush is not "bound" on the floor pan.

Then you wedge a suitable piece of timber to push the arm downwards, to allow clearance to knock off the bush, you may find a blunt cold chisel used on the part of the metalastic bush that is in contact with the hexagonal part of the arm will result in less lost action than bopping the cast iron bush housing.

Failing that, use a pad saw, or hacksaw blade to cut the remnant of the rubber void bush, then use a hacksaw to split the "tube" part and remove.

There is no need to remove the arm from the car, take another look at it tomorrow with fresh eyes, and it will fall apart for you.

And just to sicken you a little more, I replaced both bushes just before the Netherlands trip on a customers car, in..........25 minutes from start to finish on my back

Now that is a personal best for me, it normally takes me around 20 minutes per side.

Brian

[MissMoppet]

Originally Posted by marinabrian

Dave, have your glamorous assistant . . .

Never mind your glamour, I could with one of these:

[roverbarmy]

Originally Posted by MissMoppet

Never mind your glamour, I could with one of these:

That face alone would frighten the bush straight off the arm!

[rushly]

Originally Posted by MissMoppet

Am following MarinaBrian's (till now) excellent How to here
but when he says "the old bush can now be knocked rearwards off the arm" I give up. There ain't no room despite wedging various bits of timber. Please tell me what I'm doing wrong. (The nuts were a doddle)
Most grateful

Dave

Hi Dave. I thought I'd add a bit to this thread as I did this job a couple of months ago and now I'm getting older pure brute force doesn't always work. I find rubber bushes flex so much when hammered that they don't move unless you can really hammer the living daylights out them! However, if you can apply pressure to it there is a lot less wasted energy. I did this by firstly jamming the wishbone done with a bit of wood ( inch to inch and a half max ). This gives better clearance between the body and the end of the wishbone to allow the bush to come off. Then, using a crowbar lured the bush off. The end of the crowbar located inboard of the wishbone if that makes sense. Sorry I can't be more specific on the precise locating points for the crowbar to to achieve this but rest assured it can be done.

[marinabrian]

Originally Posted by roverbarmy

That face alone would frighten the bush straight off the arm!

I was about to come back with an amusing comment along with a picture, but I'll save that for the other forum I frequent

Looking again at Dave's picture, it's evident the bush had already moved, and the only thing stopping it coming off the arm, was it's positioning relative to the floorpan.

Brian

[RPWC]

Originally Posted by MissMoppet

Ah but I did. This is the post I linked to in my very first post above. I would never have attempted it without reading Brian's instructions. I can only assume that Tynesiders are a good deal tougher than us Southern Softies . . .

You wouldn’t be far wrong there.

[RPWC]

Originally Posted by MissMoppet

Never mind your glamour, I could with one of these:

Flyer (George) will be foaming at the mouth at that picture.

[bikerdude666]

If you can't get there to hit it, couldn't you get a ratchet strap type of thing through the void, attach to something that isn't going anywhere and tighten it to pull it off?

Can't remember exactly what I did this with but I know its something we had to do a couple of times on 1 of my bikes, a few jobs where simple ratchet straps have come to rescue actually.

[roverbarmy]

I used a hardwood peg, sharpened to a chisel point and tapped the bush off going around the arm in a circular fashion. They seem to stick if you just hit one side as they twist and jam on one edge. Left, right, top then bottom worked well. I had to recut the chisel end once during the procedure.

[MissMoppet]

Bring the curtain down

So Brian can change a side in a World Record breaking 20 minutes, so it’s a good job I’m not even at the starting line. After three days of fighting this on my back I’ve given up. There are better ways of passing the time. Sorry chaps, for all your help and advice: a large slice of humble pie will be winging its way to all of you on request. I decided if I ever got the d. . .n thing off I’d never get a new one on so I decided to put the two bolts back. Simple you’d think? Well, no. As the weight lifter lady above wasn’t answering the phone I wrestled some more but could never get the bolts started. I acquired a 12mm bolt, ie slightly narrower than the proper ones to line up the holes, but again my luck was out.. So it’s off to my local village garage to sort it out.

My only contribution to this problem, which no doubt will also bring a chuckle from oop t’north is that having read that the front bolt was the hardest to get off, I didn’t want to risk breaking my spanners by linking a ring spanner as everyone else does. I took the wheel off and bought a 600mm tube, ID 37mm, which snugly fitted the 18mm flexi head ratchet spanner (off eBay here ). Now that was a doddle to get off. That’s about the only success I’ve had in the last week.



Dave