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I've spent the last 8 hours changing my trailing arm bushings to poly and swapping springs. Thanks to the homemade trailing arm bushing tool, pressing the shells out/in was the easiest part of the job.
I'm too exhausted for a play-by-play, but here are some things I wish I'd known before doing the job.
1. If at all possible, remove or drop the cat-back exhaust first! If you can wait and do the TABs at the same time you do the exhaust that would be the way to go. There is just NO ROOM to get power tools in there with the exhaust in the way and it is almost impossible to drop the trailing arm enough with that damn under-axle pipe in the way. It's also near impossible to remove the spring; I scratched my freshly painted springs all to hell.
2. If you build the TAB tool, get a fully threaded bolt! McMaster-Carr part #92620A733 vs. the one recommended on the website. Trust me, you will be grateful, especially if you are installing poly bushings. Hint: the TAB tool COULD be very useful for pressing the poly bushings in.
3. The SuperPro FRONT polyurethane bushings are not well thought out! When I got my trailing arms out I found that I had a "V" bracket welded in one side of the mounting ears to center the sleeve on the front TAB. Well, the poly bushings from SuperPro did NOT take that into account. Rather than do something permanent like break the welds on the tab, I cut down the poly bushing (that was already installed, making it a pain). IF you do the FRONT TABs,then before you install them in the trailing arm, take them to the belt sander and remove about 1/8" (maybe a bit more) worth of the bushing material FROM ONE SIDE ONLY. Make sure when you press them in that the side with the missing material faces the outside of the car.
This would have been more like a 4 hour job if I hadn't run into all this. Just wanted to get it all down before I forget.
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'93 244: 'A' cam 4 deg. advanced, 25/22 sways, custom heim endlinks, poly bushings, and a lot more styling customization than I care to recount.
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