Just looking for some feedback on what people think of the ride quality when changing the front control arm bushings from rubber to poly. Did you notice a difference? If so what was it like?

I'm changing ball joints and doing a brake job on a 240 that I'm trying to keep a mostly stock ride on. I have some control arms all painted with poly bushings installed and could toss them on easily while doing the ball joints but don't want to sway to much from my plushy ride plan for this 240. The rubber bushings have visible wear but for the most part are intact.

88 245A: I tend to favor OE qualities. I did all my fronts in rubber and then all my rears in poly. Retained OE level struts/rear shocks. Now I wish I had done the fronts in poly. They give a little more controlled feel, add firmness but are not harsh. And poly is supposed to last longer. HD shocks and struts [no poly bushings] in my 87 244 M47 made it ride too harshly, passengers got car sick but it cornered well.

thanks for both response. I deceided to go ahead and change out the original bushings for the poly ones. It turns out that what a thought was a good rear control arm bushing was a bad. The rubber had separated from the crush tube and there was a ton of play in it. Hard to tell when it was installed.

Hey Al, how's it going? When I switched from rubber to poly, I already had Bilstein HD's and lowering springs, so the ride went from firm to firm. I didn't really notice much difference in ride quality, but I did notice a tighter feeling in handling.

I think the shocks and springs will make much more difference.
Greg
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My new homepage - as of 5/7/05

I replaced all the front control arm bushings with SuperPro polyurethane bushings a few months ago. The steering is a little tighter, but then again may be partly due to the Heavy Duty Bilstein struts installed concurrently with the bushings. Thr ride is good, and I don't notice any harsh responses from the front suspension system. Overall, I like the polyurethane upgrade. I also replaced the rear suspension bushings with SuperPro and replaced the rear shocks with Heavy Duty Bilsteins. The rear shocks tend to bang over bumps and may be too stiff for a plush ride.

Rustydog
1986 240DL 144k