Rear Trailing Arm Bushing Shot, Can I Replace or special tools needed? Options

[Spoke]

Well, I got closer to road ready with a new clutch.

Then on further inspection, I found the driver side rear swing arm has a bad bushing. The shiny part of the suspension ear shows how the trailing arm has been moving around. The blue screwdriver is in a hole in the metal caused by the movement of the arm at the pickup point.

This puts me in a real predicament since I have a 5-lug suspension to put on the car but have at least a month or more of work (at my pace) on the wheels (strip, polish, paint), install suspension, flare fenders, and I want to get the car on the road ASAP.

Question: How hard is it to replace a bushing? I'm thinking of repairing just this one bad bushing. Are any special tools required?

Maybe one of my local 914 brothers has a spare swing arm that I can "borrow" for a couple of months. Perhaps we can swap some parts.

Spoke

[Rusty]

QUOTE (Cloudbuster @ Feb 28 2006, 09:15 PM)

You need: A blowtorch to melt the old bushing A long stick that fits inside the arm to push the shaft out, OR A pair of vice-grips that you clamp onto the shaft nut and pull Some gloves It isn't necessary to disconnect the half-shaft.  But it definitely helps.  You will need to disconnect the brake hose. I'd put it in the three hour range, per side.  It depends which bushings you put in and how long you want them to last.  I used Elephant bushings, so I didn't have to worry about bushing-to-shaft fitting, since Elephant comes with its own shaft. Do BOTH sides. My bushing experience

Probably three hours per side... unless you're like me and need to sandblast and powdercoat everything in sight.

Then, add all kinds of stupid-time to the project. Hey, since you have the arm off, check out the axle. Doesn't that need cleaning and powercoating, too. Oh, wow... calipers could get a freshening up. Hey, I wonder if I could pull the exhaust and steam clean the underside? There's some sheet metal under here with flaking paint... hmmm... (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/blink.gif)

-Rusty (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/smoke.gif)