Good evening,

 

As the Title says, I am thinking of changing most or all of the front and rear bushes, but hopefully without the cost of changing all the arms and brackets into which they are mounted.

 

That would mean I'll need one of those kits of bush-presses that you can buy (or possibly hire) - but what is the range of sizes of bush (and especially at the small diameter end) that I would need to cater for?

 

Also, does anyone have any suggestions as to a decent fully-manual kit to buy, as they all seem to be about the £90-120 price range?

 

Thanks in advance.

 

John.

 

If anyone living within a reasonable distance of W. London has a kit, then I would be happy to come to a "mutually beneficial" arrangement to either buy or hire it from him!

Bump for the question below - any suggestions?

Good evening,

 

As the Title says, I am thinking of changing most or all of the front and rear bushes, but hopefully without the cost of changing all the arms and brackets into which they are mounted.

 

That would mean I'll need one of those kits of bush-presses that you can buy (or possibly hire) - but what is the range of sizes of bush (and especially at the small diameter end) that I would need to cater for?

 

Also, does anyone have any suggestions as to a decent fully-manual kit to buy, as they all seem to be about the £90-120 price range?

 

Thanks in advance.

 

John.

 

If anyone living within a reasonable distance of W. London has a kit, then I would be happy to come to a "mutually beneficial" arrangement to either buy or hire it from him!

Buy the new bushes, measure, bodgy up presses to suit?

Buy the new bushes, measure, bodgy up presses to suit?

There are a lot of bushes on the front & rear suspensions and probably in a range of sizes, and so I probably won't have all the right bits to "bodgy up" all the presses to suit, or the time to do that - so all I want is to be able to do the job quickly and easily, and that means having the right tools on-hand at the time to do the job without hassle.

There's only 4 (total) at the front.

 

I think the IRS rear has 12 (total) plus 4 chassis mount bushes.

 

What I'm trying to convey is that as nobody appears to be able to help you then you'll have to buy the bushes first to work out what size presses you'll need.

 

The other way I've done it in the past is to do the R&R on the suspension components myself & taken them to a suspension shop to do the removal / install of the bushes.  It's a pain in the neck riding to the workshop with a backpack full of suspension arms though.

There's only 4 (total) at the front.

 

I think the IRS rear has 12 (total) plus 4 chassis mount bushes.

 

What I'm trying to convey is that as nobody appears to be able to help you then you'll have to buy the bushes first to work out what size presses you'll need.

 

The other way I've done it in the past is to do the R&R on the suspension components myself & taken them to a suspension shop to do the removal / install of the bushes.  It's a pain in the neck riding to the workshop with a backpack full of suspension arms though.

Brad

 

Thanks - looks like I will have to buy the bushes first, but won't take them to the local machine shop that does bushes amongst other things because, the last time I did that, they charged £40 to replace 4 bushes! Cheaper, pro-rata, to buy a bush-press set!

Ho-hum, I had intended to ask about new shocks (got approx 75,000 on the factory origionals)

But perhaps need to change the bushs as well?

PLUS

I want to raise or stiffen the back end so as to prevent the towbar (an Official Skoda fitted one btw) bottoming out so easily and regularly (regardless how slow i cross certain junctions and speed bumps)

So

What do I need (to save starting a new thread and with due apologies for butting in on this thread.

cheers

M

GBP40 is a bit steep.

 

I usually take my old bushes out by demolishing them with a hacksaw or I use a socket on top & a section of waterpipe underneath.  To press them in usually only needs a flat plate on top & a short section of 1.5"-2" waterpipe underneath. 

Some of them are impossible to move without a decent press though.  We recently cracked a BMW rear hub after we got to 9 tonne of pressure.  The bush was rock solid in the housing.

 

dieseldogg.  I did my dampers at 105,000km (65k miles?) and none of the bushes were particularly sad.  It just comes down to how much movement they have got when you put some pressure on them with a pry-bar.  I'm sure changing some will have a positibve effect but I haven't had to do any yet.

 

Rear springs:  I assume you have the wagon / estate?  If you have the sedan then fit wagon springs.  Otherwise, lots of experimental options like Passat or Superb estate rears - if you get the springs from the 1BB-0YC bad roads package it will lift the rear really well.  The paint marks are silver orange orange partno 4B0511115B

 

You Brits also have access to helper springs & airbag devices as well as - there's a fair few threads about it on the forum.

 

It might also be helpful to get the colour codes off your existing springs.

 

Scout rear springs

Grayston Engineering Spring assisters

MAD Suspension - either progressive springs or Air Helpers

http://www.coilsprings.co.uk/

Brad, thank you very much, all good detailed pertinent stuff.

marcus