Is anybody familiar with the polyurethane weltermeister front a arm bushings sold at performance products? I'm interested in suspension mods for a 83 944 so I can finally do some time trials at the track. These were used in my application and they are indicated for street use only, not to be used on the track. Anybody's experience about what suspension mods work best and are affordable will be helpful. Ive heard stories of these bushings breaking at the track. yay or nay?

 

weltmeister makes several types of bushings. there are street and track bushings. check www.paragon-products.com for better prices, service, and product range. skip from paragon can tell you all you want to know about suspension mods.

you'll get as many opinions about suspension mods as there are people on this list. make sure all the stock parts are up to snuff first, then upgrade. popular upgrades include koni yellow shocks and struts, larger sway bars, and stiffer springs.

 

This is what I did to about 4 or 5 of these bushings at the track.


I'd get a weekend from one if I was lucky.


Racer's Edge and Paragon Ended up making some delrin bushings for the steel arms. I have used those for a while and they hold up so well I forget about them.

For the rear caster blocks I run the Welt reds. They seem to be ok for the loads there. Word was that Karl at Racer's Edge could not make delrin for the rear since the tolerances on stock the parts (arms/block support) were too large. That seems fine however as they appear to last.

If you are doing bushings in steel arms you should really just replace them at the same time. The steel arms are cheap from paragon as are new ball joints. I have seen cracks in steel arms near the forward bushings on most every old stock arm out there. I have not seen on fail, but since they are so cheap you might as well replace them.

PS... my experience is for track racing and severe duty. My car sees much more punishment than a DE car.

 

the poly bronze bushings from elephant racing are much better.

http://elephantracing.com/

 

Thanks for the comment Harry. The Polybronze for 944 is a new product, but it's been the hot ticket for 911/912 for some time. There is thread on pelican right now with users sharing their experience:

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/showt...hreadid=195527

Polybronze for 944 is actually for the spring plates. The original poster asked about A arms.
The old style urethane and delrin bushings shouldn't be used on A arms. Those plastic bushings are designed to pivot about a single, fixed axis. But the axis of the A arms shifts based upon alignment settings. Adjust the caster block and the axis moves. When the A arm axis and bushing axis are not aligned, the result is a pinched bushing, binding, and very high friction.

Needless to say performance sucks and in extreme cases you might get the kind of failure M758 pictured.

Note the factory rubber bush does not have this problem. It is sufficiently compliant to adapt to the changing axis. Unfortunately that same compliance allows it to compress under load, causing alignment to shuffle all over the map. Not good.

The correct performance solution is a monoball (heim or rose joint). The monoball is incompressible and holds alignment under load, but it also allows free movement along multiple axis.

Along with the Polybronze spring plate bearings, we've just introduced a series of Weathersealed Monoballs for the 944 series. The weatherseals prevent dirt and moisture from getting into the monoball, causing premature wear. With the weatherseals, the product can be used on street as well as race cars.

 

Welt did make "Black bushings" or Race bushings for the 944. They had duribility issues but I have found if you take extreme care of them they will last pretty good. The Derlin bushings paragon sells are much nicer for the price.

Also I looked at the polybronze bushing on the site and they look very nice. They are in a diffrent price range however so that might be a big factor to some people. Anyways thanks harry for showing us this option. They seem to be a good alternative to the racersedge kit stuff.

 

pricey indeed. Not to mention they are listed as being for 85-91. I have a 83.

 

pricey, but a much better product than the weltmeister crap. do it once, do it right, dont mess with it again. no more harsh squeeky bushings

go to the pelican 911 board and ask about the products chuck has developed. you guys should be glad that this type of quality product is available for your cars.

 

I could not find the delrin bushings for the front a arm. I might have to make some out of wood, this seems the only affordable alternative. The stock ones are cheap but dont perform, the poly performs but breaks, I would have to sell the car to afford monoballs. If I did'nt know any better, I'd assume some of these suspension components were made of gold and sold to kings in egypt. What's up Chuck? Don't these components really cost a few measly dollars to produce? What's up with the rediclious markup?

 

youre being sarcastic right?

 

Porsche + Racing has never been a low budget proposition. A season of time trialing will easily cost more than a typical 83 is worth. And I'm talking about entry fees and consumables, not car buildout.

My advice would be to understand your budget and set realistic expectations for what you can accomplish within that budget. Leave your car stock and let the deeper-pocket guys duke it out in the more advanced classes. The more you modify, the more expensive tracking the car becomes. You can have a lot of fun with a stock 944.

You might also consider choosing a non Porsche car to take time trialing. There are much more affordable rides and some are fun and fast too.

 

You guys arent seriously complaining about 600 bucks in bushings, right? They essentially last forever. You could choose a cheaper solution but you can see how they hold up or you could go back with stock. However, if you want to play you've got to pay.

Chuck, your response above is much nicer than I would have been.
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FWIW, I have the red welts on my a-arms (alu 85.5) and have had no issues in a year of autocrossing and several club drives. This year I put almost 6000 miles on the car, which is the most ever for me in a year.

I checked them this weekend and they are still perfect. YMMV on your application.

I plan on not changing them and using them for at least 3 DE's next year and another season of autocrosses.

 

Ok......

First of all I was going to write a reply almost exactly like Chuck's, but he beat me to it. He is 100% spot on. Other than properly exectuted spherical bearing cassettes (what Chuck is calling mono ball), all other suspension bushings rely on compliance in the bushings to account for misalignment of the control arm pivot axis (and they will all have some amount of misalignment). The stiffer the bushing, the more the bind.

As for the cost...

Oh buy. First of all, the direct costs of manufacturing them is not a few mealy dollars. How do I know? I am designing them for our Sentra SE-R and my 944. I wish they were a few measly dollars to produce. Then there is the design time, prototypes (prototyping is very expensive). As someone who produces products for sale, I can assure you that you don't just whip them out. It's one thing to produce one-off products for yourself. Quite another to design and produce production parts. Then throw in the overhead of running the business and suddenly the stuff is not so cheap.

I think it's funny how people will complain to small business owners about cost vs. price. How much does a Boxter cost Porsche in direct materials and labor? Considerably less than they sell them for. Who writes to Porsche and says, "come on, what's the deal with the big mark-up?"

 

I don't recomment the stock rubber bushings on the steel arms for the same reason my red welts were torn-up. The problem that destroyed my reds was braking loads. Under braking there is alot of load axial load on the bushing. This thing outer surface of the steel arm pushes hard on the outer flange of the bushing. The result is that the arm cuts through the flange and then you have metal crossmember to control arm contact and have screwed up aligment settings.

The rubber ones stock ones never get cut, but the slide even easier. I have seen this on my 83 944 autocrosser. Even on street tires.

The back welt bushings are too hard and brittle and will fall apart internally. I also destroyed one of these after 1 year of track days. (1-2 races)


As side note per my class rules metal bushings are not allowed (mostly due to cost reasons).