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I drove my car pretty hard -- especially off-pavement -- when it was younger, and that bushing died before 60K mi (I don't know how long I'd driven the car with the bushing ruptured before noticing it). But its exact replacement is lasting much longer.
To you guys who believe that bigger/stronger is always better:
You need to understand that Volvo spent a lot of resources trying to prevent 5-cylinder vibrations from being transmitted to and noticed inside the cabin. The two most obvious methods of attacking ths engineering problem are the mass suspended under the shallow console storage bin and the bushing in question, which was designed to provide just the right amount of fore-aft (with much less up-down) "give". I suspect someone on the engineering team could expound on the specific optimal directional visco-elastic properties that were desired and designed-in.
So after you've finished replacing the failed OEM bushing with a "more durable" aftermarket replacement, and are congratulating yourself that "I'll never have to solve that problem again", realize that you've just discarded/destroyed a solution in the form of some of the careful engineering that went into making your car what it was.
BTW, my boneheaded solution to the problem was to buy an entire new arm with a new bushing pre-installed. Take it from me, you really don't want to replace the entire arm unless it's absolutely necessary -- it's doable but too many other things must be loosened/removed...
- Dave; '95 854T, 143K mi
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