UPGRADED the lower control arm bushings, the a-arm bushings Options

[Batman722]

I was going to do a how-to but was too caught up with just getting this done, I only snapped a couple of pics at the end.
Me, Manny, and Stef knocked this out pretty easy.

I ordered some front suspension bushings from Paul in Poland



here's a pic of the control arm



(taken from this post)

I went from this bushing



to this bushing



and the other



I know the pics I took kinda suck (they're a little messy from the grease too) but I was more concerned about feeling the difference driving with them and then eating.

I have to say after launching a few times on the ride home I can really feel the difference with keeping the wheels on the ground. They really help to reduce wheel hop and it feels great.
The other thing I wicked noticed was how much tighter the front end feels during turns. They keep the front end of the car much more level to the ground and cornering is so much more controled, it's amazing.

also, ride quality was not compromised at all, which I was a bit concrened about.

The entire process took a few hours and air tools made it much easier

This post has been edited by Batman722: Jun 30, 2009 - 8:22 AM

[playr158]

Thats awesome Dustin. I was very much considering these but without prior knowledge of them, a little weary. I'm glad they worked out well for you and results are good, i'll have to pick up a set

[presure2]

good stuff D.
these bushings are awesome.
i would highly reccomend them to anyone who has a swap for sure.
definetly wheelhops less, and feels more controlled.
besides, watching the old bushing crumple up and burn was AAAWWWEESSSSSOOOMMMEE!! (can you tell i like fire?)
im definetly getting a set of these at some point in the future.

[RUNNIN-LOW]

nice!!! glad to see you guys did it..i was planning on doing this too.. but gosh i would have loved to see you burn the old bushing off and installed the new ones ! good ups! good work!

[DEATH]

Awesome D. Since all next year I will be working on my suspension I believe I should order a set of these too.

[pipes]

available for superstrut?

[Batman722]

available for superstrut?

http://stores.shop.ebay.co.uk/GT4-SUSPENSI...634Q2ec0Q2em322

for rears he does. I'm pretty sure he has bushings for the front too, just send him a message.

after driving it for a day the car handles way better, it's very responsive anytime I turn the wheel.

makes me want to do the rear too...

[BonzaiCelica]

did those things actually cost $140 for the front bushings only. cause that seems like an awful lot of money.

how easy is it to take out the ball joint, i heard it can be tricky. Also when removing the control arm, do you need to get alignment done after, or does the control arm drop straight down once all bolts are removed.

This post has been edited by BonzaiCelica: Jul 1, 2009 - 1:11 AM

[illneversellmyce...]

so you burn the old ones out? ..then just pop the new ones in? or do you need a press?

[malpaso]

wow... looks really interesting... could you make small how-to? Pretty please

[presure2]

yup, the fronts are ~ 140$. gotta pay to play when there is no market for the car.

you'll need an alignment, yes. the new bushings will throw your alignment off.

seperating the balljoint from the a-arm is easy, 2 nuts and a bolt and it seperates pretty easy.
the arm dont just drop straight out, it takes some work, im sure dustin will go into a little better detail as to why.
the basics of it is the rear a-arm bolt has a sleeve that helps hold it in place, (they are a replace when you do it part) that you may need to mess with some to get out.
dustins were pretty rusted and whatnot, so we were able to work the arm out with the sleeve still in place.

with a set of torches, you could burn them out pretty easy, but since i dont have a torch set here at the garage, we used a propane torch, and heated up the metal around the bushing to loosen it from the metal, then pounded them out with a 2lb sledge.
we pressed the new ones in pretty easily in my bench vice.

[Defgeph]

awesome stuff guys.

[BonzaiCelica]

hmm sounds good. About the installation, seems a little harder than i thought. so you just need a torch to burn out the old bushings since they are stuck in their pretty good. ya a somewhat guided write up would be nice.

ya i guess your right, you do have to pay the price for rare items. i guess this guy is the only person who makes bushings for our cars. I checked out energy suspension's website, and they dont have any bushing kits for our cars, or atleast i dont think.

would you recommend getting them for the rear since you already have experience with them on the front.

guess ill get a set for the front, before i get my next alignment in 12,000 miles from now. or maybe the bushings wont be around by then who knows....

whats the difference between these one SUSPENSION BUSHING KIT CELICA ST202, ST204, AT200 REAR
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/SUSPENSION-BUSHING-K...%3A1%7C294%3A30

and these REAR BUSHING KIT TOYOTA CELICA ST202, 204 TRAILING ARMS
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/REAR-BUSHING-KIT-TOY...%3A1%7C294%3A30

[njccmd2002]

are these the difficult things that we could not get before?

there was a whole thread about?

[3WayStunna]

This thread came up in good time!! lol, was just about to post up a thread about it all and what experiances ppl have had with these bushings.

Anywho, they do make ones for the st205
Ebay Link!

And i found a site for them, if you want a more detailed veiw of the bushings
Bushings Site

Anywho, thanks for the reveiw OP, it was very useful!! Now what about those rear bushings

This post has been edited by 3WayStunna: Jul 2, 2009 - 9:40 AM

[RedRkt01]

I sell these here in the States for Paul.......come see me over at Ctech.

[Batman722]

Glad to see you made it over, these are awesome products.

[3WayStunna]

I sell these here in the States for Paul.......come see me over at Ctech.

Couldnt find a site for ya man on google.....do you mind listing one?

[DEATH]

I sell these here in the States for Paul.......come see me over at Ctech.

Pricing? I need a full set of suspension bushings from sway bar mounts to these - I'm starting a complete suspension overhaul next year so I may be a good customer for you. Hit me up [I don't go on Ctech]

[presure2]

he's a vendor on celicatech.com
his pricing is better than buying direct from paul on ebay, cause he buys in bulk.

[easternpiro1]

What was all that hairy stuff clogging the muffler?!

GREAT stuff man!! i will be hitting him up at the end o the summer! i KNOW imma need some really soon! it is definately a MUST for any swapped driver!! i remember posting about these like 2 years ago when my bushings went to $#!T... Toyota got me for a couple hundred dollars buying the entire control arm!

This post has been edited by easternpiro1: Jul 12, 2009 - 9:00 PM

[BonzaiCelica]

since you have to use grease on the sway bar bushings that are made of polyurethane. Will these start to making noise after 10,000 miles???

[Batman722]

not if you use the right kind of grease.

[richee3]

the basics of it is the rear a-arm bolt has a sleeve that helps hold it in place, (they are a replace when you do it part) that you may need to mess with some to get out.
dustins were pretty rusted and whatnot, so we were able to work the arm out with the sleeve still in place.

I'm getting ready to replace my front bushings and I'm just trying to make sure I have everything I need before I get started.



In this diagram, is the sleeve part #90389‑21003?

[Batman722]

don't bother replacing the sleeve (or crash tube as I've heard it called).
It slides in from the top which means you have to remove (or at least lower a lot) your sub frame.

I bought new ones from the dealer but I didn't replace them, they're completely useless.

[richee3]

Good deal. I saw Manny's post and started wondering if, like the rears, I should get all new nuts and bolts. In that case, I might try to knock these out tomorrow morning and do the rears next week.

[BonzaiCelica]

the oem crash tubes are about 2mm thick if that. Doesn't the front polyurethane bushings come with grey 3-4mm crash tubes. At least it seems that way in the pictures.

[richee3]

the oem crash tubes are about 2mm thick if that. Doesn't the front polyurethane bushings come with grey 3-4mm crash tubes. At least it seems that way in the pictures.

From what I saw today, the crash tube goes through the center of the bushing, through the center of the metal insert in the poly bushing. I didn't get as far as I would have liked... I spent four hours struggling with rounded nuts on the driver side ball joint and a broken nut inside the subframe. I'll check it out more tomorrow.

[playr158]

broken nut in the subframe?

I had the nut inside the car's frame rail (that holds the subframe on) break off. Had to cut my floor pan open

[richee3]

I phrased that poorly. I had a nut inside the subframe break off, not break. The bolt in the lower control arm that runs parallel to the ground, the nut inside the subframe broke away from the subframe. I had to, regrettably, cut the subframe open. Tomorrow I'm welding a new piece of metal in place to close it back up. It beats buying a new subframe.

[ricochet1490]

you should just bring these things to ohio.... LOL nothing wrong with 5 celicas and 3 beams in the garage at once bro

When dropping the subframe for the race car, 3 of the bolts on each side go int o the frame rail.... one bolt threads into a welded nut that is just welded to some thin sheet metal that has a high tendancy to rust out... that welded nut snapped off the sheet metal on each side, not a big deal cause its a track car and the other three bolts go into FRAME instead of just sheet metal.... prolly won't even put it back in.... dunno if this is the bolt you're talking about or not

[richee3]

I got started on my bushings Monday afternoon. Within 30 minutes, I had hit huge snags. The bolt on the driver's side that runs parallel to the ground refused to come out, the lower ball joint nuts had rounded off, and the end links, in their usual fashion, stripped out. Turns out that like I mentioned in my last post, the nut inside the subframe had broken free of the subframe and was spinning freely with the bolt. After 4 hours of trying, I put things back together as well as I could and drove to where I work to use their shop. Driving with a loose bolt in my control arm was a bit nerve racking. Not because the car was uncontrollable, but because it was so strangely normal. I knew there was a problem underneath the car but I couldn't feel it from the driver's seat. Then a bunch more stuff happened that I can skip because it's boring and involved lots of dollars being spent, so I'll just get to the pictures because that's what we're all here for anyway.

Rear bushing on the driver's side wasn't really a part of the control arm anymore. It fell out with no effort whatsoever.




This is the ring around the rear bushing that has been discussed before. I didn't even try to press the new bushing in before taking these out, but I had access to a die grinder that made the removal of these rings very easy.


And a picture of the bushings installed.



Due to Murphy's Law hitting me hard, the total time I had to spend on this job was 12 hours. Yeah, 12 hours for a four hour job at most. Let's just say that nothing went properly for me.

The steering definitely feels tighter now than it did before. I currently have no front sway bar end links so I haven't been pushing the car hard, nor have I launched hard to feel the difference yet. Once I get the new end links, I'll do a bit more testing and see how much better these are.

[Batman722]

twosrus are fine for the front, usually a quick shipper too.

Nice hole in your subframe

[richee3]

twosrus are fine for the front, usually a quick shipper too.

Nice hole in your subframe

Thanks! Yeah, it was a PITA. What's worse is by the time I got the passenger side done, I forgot to have one of the other guys weld a new piece of steel over the hole to seal the subframe back up. It's rust waiting to happen until I get it fixed.

[playr158]

Oh dang look at that hole! What a bummer, but good stuff on getting the new bushings in there!

Luckily, i have brand new control arms in the mail and the bushings as well, so doing it before ever being in the car FTW

[jordisonjr]

It seems like lots of people had problems changing these out.
Was a pain in the ass when I did mine too, took a couple days to get it done.

[njccmd2002]

nothing like a good hole, where did u get the parts from?

[richee3]

I got mine from Paul in Poland, the GT4 Racing bushings. I got mine from eBay though, not his website.

http://myworld.ebay.com/gt4goodies/

[BonzaiCelica]

I got mine from Paul in Poland, the GT4 Racing bushings. I got mine from eBay though, not his website.

http://myworld.ebay.com/gt4goodies/

I've been trying to get a hold of the US distributor on celicatech but have never got a reply. it seems he hasn't been online in over 2 months.

[richee3]

Yeah, I gave up on RdRkt. Same story for me, simply no replies.

[njccmd2002]

wow the rears are pretty expensive.

[playr158]

I contacted Paul through his website. He promptly replied and i ordered. Awaiting delivery from Poland....


Why would you want to add a middle man?

This post has been edited by playr158: Aug 10, 2012 - 6:34 PM

[njccmd2002]

is there a price difference? or the same>

[BonzaiCelica]

like we were discussing the other day richee3

http://www.jap-spec-performance.co.uk/stor...?products_id=92

[Batman722]

crash tubes are useless. Everyway imaginable, don't do it.

[Tigawoods]

I am concerned that there will be slight play in the rear bushing since there isnt that sleeve to hold the mount in place. The Metal sleeve pictured just rests on the mounting surfaces.
Wouldnt really the only way to fix this be with the oem sleeves (crush tubes)?


This post has been edited by Tigawoods: Nov 26, 2012 - 10:52 AM

[richee3]

Oh wow. When you said it wasn't a tight fit around the bolt, I thought you meant it was slightly bigger. I definitely didn't have that much of a gap in my bushings...

[Tigawoods]

Yeah I contacted Paul through ebay and through his website to see what he says. Hopefully he gets back to me soon (he's pretty good about that) and hopefully I wont have to remove that bushing. It will be destroyed if I take them back out

[BonzaiCelica]

There is a guy in europe who makes crush tubes that are muh thicker than those skinny oem ones

[Tigawoods]

here is what Paul from GT4-Racing said.

"Hello,
yes you need to take new sleeves from Toyota dealer if you can't remove them from your old bushes.
yes, toyota part number is 90389-21003 and it costs about 4-5gbp here in toyota dealer.
You install them inside the bush metal sleeve, not in front subframe, just need to install it in bush metal sleeve and then put the wishbone into subframe...
Hope I answered you all clear now.
If you have any other questions, I'm here for you as support.

Cheers, Paul "

This post has been edited by Tigawoods: Nov 27, 2012 - 7:40 AM

[czwalga]

Has anyone managed to smash the crush tube? I've hit a lot of big **** racing, but I have a habbit of just driving the car 'as is'. I really should probably upgrade all of my bushings.

[Tigawoods]

Has anyone managed to smash the crush tube? I've hit a lot of big **** racing, but I have a habbit of just driving the car 'as is'. I really should probably upgrade all of my bushings.

I would think that even if they were to crush, the control arm would still stay rigid in place. I mangled the hell out of mine when taking it out and the mount was still stiff in the pocket.
As long as there isnt significant movement Id say your safe...i guess

[playr158]

So you need crush tubes inside the bushings that come from Paul...good to know.
Maybe i'll grab a set of those aluminum ones thank Bonzai linked to.

This post has been edited by playr158: Nov 27, 2012 - 3:48 PM

[Tigawoods]

I ordered the OEM toyota ones. Ill post pics when I get em

[richee3]

Mine didn't need them. There was a slight gap but nothing to be worried about.

[Tigawoods]

There is truth to Dustin saying the tubes are not needed. With 150ftlbs to torque those bolts, your compressing the pocket that the arm is in, so for the most part, it shouldnt move, I just wanted the tubes as an extra security measure.




I took this from my progress thread



For the crash tubes, the "right" method for installing them would be to drop the subframe and drop the tubes in from the top. And in my quest to find a way NOT to drop the subframe I did it this way:


Since the crash tubes from toyota are fairly thin in thickness, I put them into the bushing hole (arm uninstalled). There are two different ends to the tube. One is tapered in and the other tapered out.
The tapered in end would be facing down upon installation.

Here is where my lazy crafty...ness came into play.
When the tube is centered in the bushing, about 1/4 of the tube sticks out on either end. Having it like this will NOT allow you to pop in the mount in the pocket...there just isnt the clearance for that. (hence why the proper way is to drop them in from the top) SO.
I took a mallet and hammered both of the ends of the tube inward and so they would be flush with the bushings metal center.
At that point, the arm will be able to be installed, and when aligned, I took a screw driver and pryed back out the knocked in lower end, and took a long screwdriver and hit the upper knocked in end so that it would be unfold back to straight.

does that make sense? I really should have taken pictures.

and this will more than likely NOT be able to be done with those thicker crush tubes. Those would require the subframe to be dropped.

[Batman722]

I always try to speak the truth Glad you got them settled.

The tubes are thin and they are an extra security measure.
When I first did my bushings I bought new tubes and was wicked disappointed as to how thin they are. The amount of work needed (lowering the subframe properly) to get these in didn't justify them to me.
Their purpose is if the large bolt were to break clean off then the arm wouldn't just slide out, the tube would hold them in. IMO if I'm in a situation where the big bolt breaks the arm staying in is probably the least of my worries.

[Tigawoods]

IMO if I'm in a situation where the big bolt breaks the arm staying in is probably the least of my worries.

TRUTH haha

[garin]

Yeah I contacted Paul through ebay and through his website to see what he says. Hopefully he gets back to me soon (he's pretty good about that) and hopefully I wont have to remove that bushing. It will be destroyed if I take them back out

you are talking about the race on the big bushing? if so thats where an air hammer helps out. these are great bushings... did you get them in yet?

[Tigawoods]

yeah theyve been in for a few weeks now

[garin]

you like? lol i dig mine... gotta hit me up when youre home.

[Tigawoods]

well they LOOK good haha
car isnt back down yet.
Ill be back in the area the 24th till after new years

[garin]

ok you have my number lol. hope to cya then.

[njccmd2002]

another option, but higher price???

http://www.polybush.co.uk/shop/view/676_To...-_1999%29_ST202

vs the original

http://www.gt4-racing.eu/index.php/toyota-...spension-bushes

[jordisonjr]

Has anyone had issues with these wearing out fairly quickly?
I installed min July 2011 (by the looks of of it, from my posts in this thread) and last night discovered that on the driver side wheel, the bushing towards the back of the car has quite a bit of play, and is causing a huge clunking noise. You can actually see the wheel move forward and back within the wheel well while accelerating and stopping, and I can recreate the sound/movement by simply shaking the wheel front to back with my hands, with the cars weight on the wheels. And I'm pretty frustrated that these are worn already.

When I replaced them, I torched out the existing bushing (leaving the ring inside the arm) and brought it to a mechanic to press in the new bushing. I'm not sure if the ring was left in the arm, or taken out, but from the looks of it, everyone that's done these bushings have taken the ring out. I also did NOT use the OEM crush tube within the bushing as Tigawoods did, but it seems no one else did either. Could either of these two things cause extra movement in the arm or per-mature wear? Or were the bushings just installed wrong? Right now it seems the rear bushing is the only one moving, but I've yet to put the car in the air and inspect closer.

I did a quick visual inspection, and the bushing appears to be intact, and not cracked or torn, so I'm a little confused as to why this would be causing noise after about 3.5-4 summers of regular driving and no track use. Any insight would be great, as I'd like to avoid replacing these bushings again. And if they do need replacing already, I will probably be going back to OEM which, IIRC, cost about 500 CDN, and not something I'd really like to do either.

[richee3]

I'm not a huge fan of my poly bushings. I'm on my second set. I had my doubts whether the first set was worn out or not so I got new control arms and bushings and no change. I sent my old set up to bloodMoney and now he says he hears them clicking.

[jordisonjr]

I'm not a huge fan of my poly bushings. I'm on my second set. I had my doubts whether the first set was worn out or not so I got new control arms and bushings and no change. I sent my old set up to bloodMoney and now he says he hears them clicking.

Hmm Really? How long did you have your first set in for? So when the first set wore out, you bought new control arms, and new poly bushings, and there was still noise?

I liked the feel of them when originally installed, but if they're going to wear out that fast its not worth it. I'm surprised at how quick this happened, is it started out as a clunk very randomly, and got louder over about 2 - 3 weeks, and then one day I had to brake fairly hard and there was a pop, and now there's a consistent clunk upon braking/acceleration. Perhaps a bolt has broken or something, but I'm going to tear into it Wednesday and update this thread with what I find.

Perhaps we were all a little quick to give praise to these bushings, as there really had been no long term reliability demonstrated out of them when this thread was originally started.

This post has been edited by jordisonjr: Aug 11, 2015 - 11:21 AM

[jordisonjr]

Well, I'm still driving the car normally, and so far so good.
I wouldn't say been driving aggressively, but I definitely have not been taking it easy, and no issues as of yet.

[njccmd2002]

I did use the crash tubes. Twice. Silver and black car. But the vert is down...