StoogeMoe

I've been thinking about putting delrin bushings in the rear swing plate on my '83. Everybody talks about the positives, but what about the negatives?

Will the ride be harsher? Will the car be noisier inside? Will they squeak? Will they last long?

Potomac-Greg

I did it. No noise no harshness. It did require a little bit of sanding in order to fit inside the torsion tube. Once you remove the rubber bushing, and completely clean both surfaces, the delrin will slip over the spring plate, but it may not fit inside the torsion tube cleanly. I had to sand them down. You want snug, but not so snug that the spring plate cannot rotate freely (with some friction).

Lemming

+1. It was a pain in the butt to do. Getting the old rubber off and getting things cleaned took me at least 2 hrs of hard work. There there's the sanding of the delrin, fitting, removing, more sanding, fitting, removing, more sanding - well you get the idea.

krystar

getting the rubber off is super easy for me now heh. takes literallly 5 minutes.

get a MAPP gas torch from home depot. fire it up and heat the inside of the spring tube till the rubber starts to smoke, takes about a minute continuous. run a xacto blade along the circumference of the bushing where it touches the flat spring plate. drive long big flat screwdriver down length of the rubber bushing, pry up and out. bushing will either come off as a donut or split in two. any residual, just use the torch and burn it till it's warm and squishy and wire brush it off. finish with soft wire wheel on drill. sparkling clean

Potomac-Greg

That's probably better than the way I did it -- and less smokey.

potent951turbo

I'm guessing thats well done?

krystar

should be overdone

did u actually grill some steaks afterwards? hehe

StoogeMoe

Mmmmmm. Smoked spring plate bushings.

I'm really trying to talk myself into not doing this but my bushings are shot

shiners780

It's all in the prep work. Use a brake hone to smooth out the recesses that the bushings set into. That way you're putting a perfectly round bushing into a perfectly round hole, less chance of binding. The bushings might need to be pressed onto the spring plates, no big deal any repair shop can do it if you don't have a press (make sure they put them on the right way!) As Greg said they should be real snug, barely able to move them by hand. Any play and you're defeating the purpose. I've had mine in for 5-6 years of track duty now, no binding or squeaking.

In this pic the end cap on the right is honed, the one on the left is not:

schwank

The job took me forever to clean all the spring plate bushings up. What a PITA. I run the Welmeisters at this point and those are the least of my concern when it comes to harshness and vibration in the race car!

Potomac-Greg

I didn't hone, but got close with a Dremel and little flappy sanding wheel. I used the "spring plate in the freezer + delrin boiling in water" technique to slide the bushings on. It was perfect. The slid on, and once the surfaces returned to room temperature, they were fused.

StoogeMoe

Hey Shiner, did you also brake hone the torsion bar carrier?

murrayg

Does anyone have pictures of one of these bushings?? I've got a lathe and a bunch of Delrin...

shiners780

Yes.

shiners780

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