Some feedback on the lower supension bushings on my 2005. On the first side I had a devil of a job getting the new bushing pressed back in. First, the 'eye' of the shock was hardly a circle, but the Uro repllacement was several thou' over. The diameters at the ends of the press-fit bushing was even more, as in 'sway-back'. A mandrel was devised and material removed, first by file and then polishing with grades of emery. Until the magic number was reached, the thing would **** every time I tried to start the fit-up. Moving over to shock two: this time I trued the eye as much as possible with a heavy C clamp. The Uro part was a gigantic 8 thou oversize, so a fair amount of time was consumed reducing the OD and reducing the sway-back. I have never seen anything machined like that - in fact, I don't know how it could have been done, unless it occurred when the center tube was installed. Several tries to insert the bushing resulted in more jams, requiring the bushings removal for more 'tweaking'. Unfortunately, with only 1/8" to go the thing jammed again and this time I couldn't get it back out. Other than stripping the threads of a 1/2" threaded rod and buckling the exhaust pipe adapter (see other post) I gave up and drove the shock to a machine shop to be put on a press. Don't know whether all is well or not. Bottom line, between Jag's out-of-round eyes and the oversized Uro parts, this turned into a miserable job, and it's not over yet!

 

Thanks for the heads up.

 

I have a 20 Ton press so I practiced pressing the bushings in and out of my old shocks that were laying around and determined it was pretty easy to screw up the new bushings when pressing them in (and I knew these bushings fit).

The reason why I have old shocks laying around is because I bought new bilsteins. If you don't have have CATS, I highly recommend buying new bilsteins when redoing an XK8 suspension.

 

^^ Agreed. At less than $100 each with free shipping from several online vendors, new Bilsteins are the way to go if you truly want to take the time and effort to refurbish your suspension. These cars are getting quite long-in-the-tooth now and benefit greatly from new shocks vs. just new shock bushings....

 

I replaced these lower joints a couple of weeks back (probably should not have), Uro parts as well. The hard part was to somehow come up with support for the shock eye. I removed the rubber seal off the joint to expose a good pressing surface. A regular socket fit on there perfectly, big enough to clear the center tube, and small enough to clear the shock eye. I have a (cheap) 10-ton press that came with these thick steel plates. These plates have various notches and cut-outs that ended up providing enough support for the edge of the eye. As usual "one you know how", this job is actually pretty straightforward. FWIW, putting pressure on the center tube ended up destroying the old joints. Pressure really needs to be applied to the outer body. Overall probably a cheapskate's false economy, but I thought I would pass my experience along. Best of luck, keep us posted.

 

I've run into the out-of-round bushing bores too. It helps to put the new bushings in the freezer for an hour or more and remove them one at a time just before you press them into the control arm. If necessary, you can also dip the control arm in hot water (don't use a torch on suspension components, which are often heat-treated and tempered).

If a bushing just doesn't want to start, you can grind/file/sand a more pronounced chamfer on the leading edge of its outer ring to help it center more easily in the bore.

Cheers,

Don