Okay this was not funny. I just last night finished replacing the Trailing Arm Bushings on my 240 DL Sedan using the home brew TAB tool.

The home brew TAB tool that is so illustrated and discussed in this forum misses on some substantive points - it kept me and a volunteer under the car till 12 midnight. 12 hours for 4 bushings! It was 4 1/2 hours to disassemble, press out and in new front end bushings and assemble the rear bushing for installation under the car. The other was 7 1/2 hours of rigorous effort, and "experience," to remove the original bushings and reassemble the car in the dark.

Note on front trailing arm bushing removal. The 1.6" ID Pipe I had was a 1.5" plumbing nipple that measured 1.6" exactly - EXCEPT that I did not notice it was a welded nipple and not an extruded one meaning that there was a weld obstructing the inside of the pipe and the front trailing arm bushing would not slide into it. Higher power provided some discarded auto bearing rings by the press that did work.

If you haven't found it yet here is the comprehensive view of the home brew TAB Tool:
http://www-ese.fnal.gov/People/wilcer/volvo_trailing_arm_bushing_tool.htm

1) When aligning the tool - "they" mean EXACTLY! Any deflection off axis can rack the parts and cross thread the bolt - and I mean SMALL deflection of 1/32". Have more than ONE bolt available in case you need to cut the first cross threaded "learning experience" off with a metal eating grinding wheel. This is a big challenge when the old rubber bushing is so torn up that the steel bolt sleeve is no longer in the center.

Clamping the drive end of the TAB tool is what got me to the "learning experience." Don't experiment - heat the misaligned steel sleeve with a torch and pull out the steel sleeve (channel lock pliers are good). Note rubber burns - have something to put it out if for some reason it does not stay contained and protect the surrounding area (I was mostly concerned about the brake cable) with asbestos cloth. Removing the original steel sleeve allows the TAB tool bolt to get through the center of the steel casing for proper alignment. That way there is no MAYBE about it.

2) When they show washers - "they" mean greased washers, and for that matter bolt threads too. And you will likely need a dozen washers for the reinstallation (see below).

3) When referring to difficult or hard or needed extra tools - "they" mean that the original steel casing around the rear rubber bushings are rusted into place and will require some herculean efforts (in my case an impact wrench and breaker bar). I did use PB Blaster for several days prior to the attempt and will always have it in my tool kit for future work. Also get a strip of sand paper and clean the center part of the old bushing that is accessible through the brackets to eliminate any binding due to "cra_" getting jammed in the leading hole. Get the car up in the air where you will be able to apply leverage. Jack stands were a minimum.

4) When they say the tool is designed to remove the bushing and casing - "they" mean REMOVE - installation was not designed into it. I used IPD SuperPro urethane bushings and once they are tapped into the mounting bracket there is no room to install the assembly by using the TAB tool in reverse. Note the IPD TAB Tool has different cups for the installation.

I borrowed a home brew TAB tool and the Item C that is supposed to be for adjusting bolt length was well locked in place as tight as it could go. The challenge was getting more length out of the bolt, so this part was already adjusted to the minimum. I really thank the guy that trusted me with borrowing the TAB tool by mail but when I called about the install it turned out that IT WAS the smoke and mirrors headache I ran into and he couldn't remember the trick.

I lucked out that my friend (who also supplied floor jack, access to hydraulic press and impact wrench) had a metal dish he uses for aligning bits while drilling. This jig was shaped like a cup, fit over the steel casing and urethane bushings, was about and inch deep and had a greater than 1/2" hole in the middle (there is a God). Using this drilling jig allowed the bolt length (given ADDED washers and on occasion a socket) to work. I seem to have missed that people are largely installing new rubber bushings and they may not have some of the challenge that the urethane bushings add in use of the home brew TAB tool. For me the bolt was way short once the new assembly was tapped into the first bracket.

5) When they say push the new bushing assembly into place - "they" mean with half a dozen set and resets with washers and pressing plate and socket to get the new casing in place. The casing needs to be dimensioned into place there are no stops (1/8" equally on both sides on my car) (my bad in missing this note).

6) When IPD says to assemble the new rear TAB - they must be counting on using their TAB tool. With the home brew TAB tool and the improvised reinstallation method I had to use the urethane bushings will push out the back side until you bring pressure to bear onto the metal casing in order to press it back into the mounting brackets. The drilling jig plate, I had available to me, worked well in reverse and pressed the urethane bushing and bolt sleeve back into the casing after it was set. BTW I got a free DVD with the 'front' bushing set from IPD and you have to know that they must have disassembled and greased everything before the quick and easy DVD was made to jump past the life experience you might just end up having.

7) When they say support the car - "they" mean have four extra jacks (I used two 1 1/2 and 2 tone jacks I use in construction in conjunction with temporary wood blocks) to push the trailing arm up in to place and to twist the differential to align bolt holes. These extra jacks also helped make room above the exhaust to use the impact wrench.

All that said the car drives like new. The interior squeaks have stopped and the car holds on curves and I no longer feel that I riding on Jell-O. I have posted on alignment and ground-to-vehicle clearances in the past and I need to go revisit these now with the car on a working suspension. For as long as I pushed the old bushings, having a firm ride is a dream and if it may be a stiffer ride than rubber does not enter into my thinking. What does enter in is that if and when the new urethane bushing come up for replacement I will not be needing (God I hope it works out this way) a super press or all the heavy leverage that was needed on the old rubber ones.

As the guy who sent the TAB tool and forgot the assembly trick, the more I've though about it, I'm thinking it must be the poly bushings that needed entirely different stuff for reassembly. Since I've never seen the poly TAB bushings, it never really occurred to me that they would be that different.

Thinking back on it, the first time I did the job the first SIDE of the car took me 10 hours. The other side took me 3. I did it on my 242GT last year and the entire job took 3.

Jobs on cars seem to ALWAYS be subject to the "didn't see that one coming" curse. Things that take 10 minutes can turn into 4 hours with a simple stripping of a bolt, breaking of a part, etc. Doesn't mean that it isn't horribly stressful...

Nate
--
1997 850, 1979 242GT, 1990 740GL

I haven't done one of these for several years, since I haven't owned a 240 for quite a while (until last week) but in 2000, I built the tool from plans online from parts at Home Depot.

We have used it four times (my old 86 245, an 82 245 turbo, a 79 GT, and my '91 244)

Every time we used it it worked like a charm.

However, on my 86 (the first car we ever did) we almost screwed up the shape of the trailing arm. Things were way too dry and rusty. The lesson learned was LUBRICATE everything. We soaked the trailing arm bushing in PB Blaster, put wheel bearing grease on the threads of the bolt and associated washers.

My tool I made has an offcentered hole in the top of the 'drift' piece, and it still works just dandy.

The last car we did took maybe 30 minutes. I think we had one 3.5 ton jack on the differential (nobody ever said I was the sharpest tool in the shed.) and it worked pretty quickly.

My friend moved away and has my tool, but he's supposed to be sending it back in the mail shortly. I plan on replacing these bushings in this '93 I just got. Before your post, I wasn't worried in the least ;)

How in the world do you get the job done in 30 minutes? I don't believe it.

It takes that long to get the car on jacks, securely blocked and the tires out of the way.

If you have a procedure post it. All the "it is so easy" is what got me into a bind.

This job can be extremely difficult even with the Volvo tool.

It is time well spent before hand to clean up the area days in advance and soak with PB Blaster. The last ones I did I used dental picks to scrape as must rust as I could from the junction of the "ears" and the sleeve between applications of PB Blaster and repeated tappings with a hammer. That extra time paid dividends when I finally got down to using the tool to remove the old bushings.

Anyone who has changed out those bushings feels your pain....

Randy

One of the biggest factors on this job going well or not is rust. If the car is from the south the job is difficult if it is from the rust belt it can be horrible. Dan

to be honest i never had these problems with my TAB tool (never returned to me after i lent it out, btw). it was used to install the bushing case back into place and that worked nicely. never broke a bolt--i used the grade 8, 1/2-20.

I wish the bolt had "broke" instead of cross threading. That would have saved a lot of time.

what grade is the screw and the nut? did you run the entire screw into and back out of the nut several times? my grade 8 screws and nuts didn't thread together that nicely, so i ran a tap into the nut and a die onto the screw before i used them.

Good information, especially for someone planning this job for the first time like myself.

Tom

I agree, rust = a huge headache doing this job. No rust = a 2 to 3 hour job that really isn't too bad to accomplish.
Charles