Hi there I need to replace a few if not all the rear bushes on my mk2 octavia. What make is your go to for quality and reliability. Been using Febi for drop links etc but finding they aren't lasting as long as they used to. Never had much faith in firstline or napa etc. Don't want to go down the polybush route due to cost.

Alasdair

It's often very difficult to know who actually manufacturers what parts, the likes of febi just seem to put their names to some parts or just supply them IIRC and the part will have a different name or boxing.  First Line do make some of their own parts and have the Borg & Beck brand (or they did last time I looked) but quality ain't what it was many years back.

 

P1ss-poor Chinese rubber has been knocking about for a couple of decades now, perhaps when all the old stock is sold thing might have or will improve, perhaps not.

 

Is VWŠkoda stock parts quality any good for suspension bushes?

 

I think a lot of better aftermarket stuff was product in somewhere like Poland or that sort of country, I forget the details now but looking on suppliers or manufacturers can give details of the manufacturing or main distribution centre.

 

There are different types and makers of polybushes and with those some are better than others and some people seem better at fitting them than others.  If you are on your second replacement of standard bushes then the price difference doesn't look so wide.

 

Sorry I can't really help but I'd be interested to know the answer myself, problem is it takes many years of fitment to say any are good and longer lasting, really bad p!ss-poor rubber stuff would only take months or weeks to start showing how bad they were, hopefully those times have passed now.

 

Good luck.

 

Many thanks. Over the years the brands that seem to last as everything else have got poorer. My old garage stopped fitting first line due to poor rubber and quality and Borg and beck as they are owned by firstline. they said fine for an MOT but customers were coming back within a year looking for replacements. Will probably go with febi/blueprint unless someone on here has good reckomendation. As you said you don't know who is actually making them. They could all be coming from the same factory and then labelled and boxed for different brands. I fitted firstline to an old volvo 940 a few years ago . Comlete front end suspension/bushes etc  and they lasted just over a year. Might try Skoda to see what their prices are like but wether they are the same now as fitted to the car who knows.

Alasdair

Yeap it was a race to the bottom but as the Yanks found getting things as cheaply as possible from China wasn't a good idea.  My neighbour gets so much very, very cheap stuff from China, some of it quite reasonable but most not, that he gets offered tokens for "free" stuff and has offered me a few bits often they are a complete waste of resources, a few might last one use I expect.

 

I used to order parts for my "classic" (over-priced, over-valued very old) car(s) so I know the problem of quality goes back decades and a good number of years ago I wondered how it would take to expand to the used car and newer car parts market.  My "classic" car owned as tight-fisted so customer demand for low priced and as few actually drive let alone use the "classic" they own durability means a lot less than the lowest retail price.  One response was to offer good quality parts (i.e. previous quality or higher) at higher retail price, this wasn't too successful as the moany old gits and those that didn't know (or want) better still carried on buying the cheap parts in their masses.  Another option was to have an even lower price and quality range, the following is just one example from Front Line Ltd. -

 

"Plus, in 2012 the company responded to its customers feedback to introduce a competitive alternative to the First Line and Borg & Beck premium quality ranges. The Key Parts brand was introduced and caters for only the high-volume references for selected ranges and is aimed at meeting the price conscious side of the aftermarket. See the Key Parts site to learn more." - https://www.firstline.co.uk/AboutUs

 

Don't go with VWŠkoda for front dampers if they're the same quality as my wife's 2015 ones, replaced after 6 years, replacements "misting" after 11 months use and I'm with you I don't know how good their bushes are given all the noises on my wife's car.  If you can get a good make and set of polybushes and fit them correctly they should be good in (standard road) performance and longevity, whose and what these are sorry I don't know.   Cheers, Nigel.