Fun with Polybushes today!

[alcashj94]

Changed my front wishbone bushes to poly today, they were an advisory on the MoT last August so thought it was time to do then now the sun is out for a couple of days.
Have to say that although the old Volvo bushes moved with the pry bar there was no breaking down of the rubber or splitting - seems to me they are soft by design, plenty of air gaps and interlocking lumps of rubber. Well destroyed now to get them out!

Thanks to Martin for the 'how to' a while back, set me on the right track. I thought about how I was going to do the job for a while and spent some time making a tool to push them in with which worked well, you can see it in the pictures. Biggest issue was getting the bush to start in the wishbone tube, I had no luck trying to nip the lip in with a screwdriver as Martins guide so I used a jubilee clip to compress the end down to the diameter of the hole, this worked well.

Anyway. here are some pics, first side took over three hours but the second was two once I had the method sorted. Also used the tool to fit the pin into the polybush.

[Harvey]

Nice work that man.

[JUDGENINJA]

Cool clamping tool.

[Biff]

Nifty bit of kit. Impressive! ;)

[jdavis]

Great work. Good thinking with the tool.

[Harvey]

I think I will have to have a road trip and say hi now the weather is getting better.would be good to meet up some time.

[M-R-P]

superb effort there mate, really like the idea of the tool. I can see it being copied a few times lol.

I tried the jubilee clip method but. it kept slipping and annoyed me so I gave up and resorted to fruit force lol.

[JamesT5]

Oh, a prelude to my new (to be) polybushed wishbones.

[alcashj94]

Thanks for the comments guys.

One thing that is not clear in the pics is that the large tube is chamfered of to nothing at the 'inner' end on one side so it fits in against the wishbone arm, if you don't do that it won't clear the hole to let the poly come through. The opposite side at the 'outer end is also chamfered so it fits beside the chassis rail. It doesn't show very well because I happened to have a tin of white spray marking paint on the end of the bench and got carried away!
Large tube is 2 inch water pipe, some 10mm studding and a bit of bar that was a convenient size, welded a large washer to the end that pushes the poly to spread the load.

Harvey, yes it would be good to meet up sometime seeing as we are in the same town, I guess I could have suggested the same but I must admit to being lazy when it comes to meeting people!

[AndysR]

Nice job, fit and forget and the improvement over standard is excellent.