Immediately after the first drive, in typical fashion, it was time to pull the car to bits again.
This time it was to replace the perished and torn rear trailing arm bushes. These needed to be replaced for the upcoming WOF. I had ordered a set of Monster Sport bushes for just this occasion.
To make my life easier, I lucked out and managed to grab a pair of decent-looking arms from a pretty sad-looking HA11S at Pick A Part,
This allowed me to refurbish the arms without having to remove them from the car first. This, as it turns out, was very fortuitous – More so since I actually intended to swap these stock arms into the car as they are and then refurbish the original ones once removed…
I ended up deciding against that idea and just refurbishing these arms, as the bushes in them weren’t looking too hot anyway.
Strangely, I noticed that the forward bush was different between the two arms. Not sure if this means one was replaced in the past
The Monster Sport kit comes with three new bushes per arm
I got sick of pressing bushes in and out using various old bits of scrap, so finally opened my wallet and bought a press tool set, and I’ll tell you what, it made this job a doddle.
You pick the right inner and outer cups and out the bush comes
The slightly bigger bushes on the other end of the arm required a different pair
Which left me with a nice empty arm, ready to press some bushes into
The new bushes are meant to be a firmer rubber compound, and they look very similar to the stock bushes. The rear bushes seem to be pretty universal for orientation, but I put the red marking to the top, just as a matter of course.
The front bushes need to be fitted in the same orientation as they are removed
A little CRC on the outside of the bush to help it slip in, and with the new tools, once again, it all went smoothly
Nice new bushes
Once all the bushes were replaced, I wire-brushed the arms and scuffed them up for a quick paint
Once the arms were dry, it was time to remove the old ones on the car and swap them over.
I jacked the back of the car up and supported it on axle stands, making sure to give myself enough space on the front trailing arm mount to actually be able to remove the bolt/arm safely.
And as a reminder, this is why I’m doing this
The first step is to support the rear beam and remove the lower shock bolt, as this blocks access to the forward, rear bushing bolt
And then it’s just a case of simply removing the three bolts, and the arm comes right out. Not much to see, so here it is after I have done the reverse, and installed the arm and bolts again
Because the bolts go through rubber bushes, it’s important to jack the beam up as close to ride height as possible, before torquing the nuts.
So, why was it fortuitous that I didn’t reuse the arms off the car? Because the RH side one is a banana
So that’s good, I have nice upgraded bushes, and an arm that’s actually straight. No wonder the bushes were torn; they were doing their best in a bad situation.
Of course, because it’s me, this wasn’t the end of it… I made the mistake of noticing that one of my rear drums was sticking. So I decided to have a “quick look”.
I wish I didn’t (but I’m glad I did)
To be continued.