Hotshoe

I have some 87 Turbo control arms that I want to rebuild but I noticed there is a steel sleeve where the bushing goes.

Can this be removed? Should this be removed? If so, how? I have some delrin bushings I want to install from Paragon but I was so pumped I just now noticed the sleeve. There definitely in there good.

Travis - sflraver

Getting those out are a pain. Since they are made in halves it is even hard to press them out , if you have a press. The best way to do it in the garage is to hold the arm in a bench vice and slice a groove in the bushings with a hack saw. You have to take the blade off and put it thru the hole before connecting it again to the saw. Once you have a groove cut in them you can tap around the center space where the bushings meet in the middle with a hammer and punch. If you are lucky, they sleeves will start to move. Once they move out a little you can flip the arm around use the vice to grab the lip on the outside that is now away from the arm a little. You then wrestle with it , back and forth, using the arm as leverage.
Not a particularly fun job at all and there are not bushings available right now that retain the steel sleeves that I know of.

schwank

I had this problem with the trailing arm sleeves. At the machine shop where we pressed out the originals, we ended up beating the crap out of the sleeves with a BFH and a BF chisel to get them out.

Hotshoe

Thanks Travis!

That's unfortunately what I thought. It's going to be hairy to get them out without damaging/marring the arm. To make matters worse there is some corrosion which indicates to me they are fused in there good.

I was going to talk to you soon about your ball-joint kits. I also need a driver's control arm because the one that I have is non-rebuidable. Do you have any 87+ arms without bushings that you want to move?

Smoker324

I found that notching the end lips of the sleeve at 12,3,6,9 with a hack saw and then using a punch and dead blow hammer to turn the lip out enough to get a pair of vice grips on it -- then twisting and more hammering got them out pretty quick.

I was thinking the job would be harder. You def need a good vice mounted to a benchtop and some wood to hold the control arm during the beating.

Others use the hacksaw method. YMMV

-Dan C.

Travis - sflraver

Control arm cores are at a premium around here lately. It just depends on what day it is and what we have. I took the core rebuild program off line that we were running for lack of cores. Started over a year ago with around 100. Now we are down to just a few and those get taken by people that call for them.
We have plans in the works for poly bushings that use the metal sleeves but I am not sure when they will be completed.

Hotshoe

Thanks!

I'll give you a call soon and we'll see what's around.