Our Fabia VRs has gone in for MOT today and failed on worn console? and front antiroll bar bushes.

The car is 5 years old but has only done 27k from new and has not been driven hard at all.

Is this normal? I appreciate that rubber (if the bushes are rubber) will deteriorate over time but this seems somewhat excessive.

If the car was high mileage and had been thrashed all the time I could understand it.

Looks like costing best part of £300 to get it through the MOT.

Ive never had anything like this on any other car Ive owned and am well upset about it.

Has anyone else had similar failures.

Its well documented that the console bushes are indeed dire, remedies are also on the site.

Can see why they would fail on them, but it shouldnt fail on an ARB bush.

That's unfortunate mate...

They are not good generally but saying that, mine is nearly 5 years old and has over 80k and they are still fine....

Mine is not 'thrashed' but driven 'briskly' most of the time....

Just because it's driven slowly doesn't mean that they will last any longer than ones like mine but I suppose they all deteriorate at different rates....

I wouldn't see how it would fail on the ARB bushes??

You can kill bushes very quickly (I found) by not slowing down enough for speed bumps and parking manoeuvres that included kerb mounting.

It doesn't take much either, speeds in other cars over speed bumps that are fine will do the Fabia's bushes in.

Or poor road surfaces you commute over?

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Edited 4 March, 200917 yr by reflex88

I'll let you know if a 5 year old car with 75K miles of mixed driving passes on saturday...

I think its only the console bushes that its failed on, not the ARB bushes but apparently the failure of the console bushes leads to knackering the ARB bushes so we are having them done as well.

Could well be the state of the roads here thats done them in but Im still amazed that the VW group puts out something this crap.

Dealer says its time as well as mileage that does them in but does that mean that if a car is 5 years old and hasnt been driven then the bushes will be knackered?

Strange to see that some cars can do 80k and still be OK. perhaps VW have different sources for the bushes and its pot luck what you get.

well like a timing belt, they are rubber and can dry out, crack, and basically fail over time rather than wear

Suspension rubbers should be treated as a consumable IMHO. While some cars seem to go forever on original bushes and pass MOTs, changing the bushes usually transform the ride and handling. If the you think the Fabia is bad, buy a Morris 1000, and if you use rubber bushes rather than poly bushes, you will be changing them every 8,000 miles.

You can protect the bushes from the elements by spraying them with white PTFE based spray grease. Added advantage of preventing squeaks as well. They will still wear out, but you will probably get more like 50,000 miles out of them. Salted roads are the killer of all things rubber.

Well we got the car back today after having the new bushes fitted.

Better half says it has transformed the handling and stopped a lot of the roughness.

If they go again Ill fit them myself as I should have the Innocenti De Tomaso Mini out of the garage by then.

Must be better as she nearly kept up with me on the way back home.