Poly Bushes fitted on front arms....NICE!

A

Aebous

Elite
 Okinawa
A little 2 sentence back story first...
My car failed MOT for a worn balljoint on the control arm. So since I had poly bushes on order I went ahead and got the arm replaced and the control arm bushes fitted. I would of liked to have gotten the rest but Pete's Autotech in Telford is having problems getting the rest of the bushings. Ah well, I went ahead and got the fronts replaced and OMG what a difference. Just the fronts make the car feel like new again. I did notice a little bit more bumpiness (is that a word?) as far as ride comfort. The steering is much improved (and steering feel), now even without sport mode on the steering feels quite tight. I can't wait for the rest of the bushings to come in.
 
Yeah, I wanting to wait until the rest comes in but it's looking like I'm getting a bit of side wear. It was just 1ea control arm and lower control arm bushes....should I?

Oh does poly bushes require lubing? If so which grease/oil?
 
Excellent, ive got a set ready to go on mine :thumbsup:

How many miles has yours done Aebous? Maybe i should buy the arms too!
 
It seems work arms and bushes are a feature of every service on my car... can you link to the ones you ordered so I can get a set in ahead of the inevitable in the new year? :)
 
I've got 82,000 miles on the car. To be fair though for a year I've pretty much driven on a farm road (b/c?) that is nothing on bumps at the nearside. Which IMO is why the balljoint was so worn. Well that and left hand drive. I had the Indy check the other control arm as well and while it was somewhat loose it wasn't enough to warrant changing. It didn't even get an advisory on MOT.


Spectre I had Peter order it for me at Autotech Performance in Telford. He's extremely knowledgable and doesn't charge a lot.
http://www.autotechperformance.co.uk/index1.html

The downside right now is he is having problems getting the full set. I'm ultimately getting all the bushes replaced, but the factory had a fire I'm told so they are backorder.
 
My car was in at Grosvenor Motors yesterday to sort a few MOT advisories, when they phoned with prices I asked about fitting stiffer anti-roll bars. I was told to save my money and try changing the bushes first - was informed the standard BMW ones aren't as good as they should be, as with the springs / OEM run flats it is one of the few things BMW hasn't got right.

They replaced the Front Wishbone Rear Bush (1 below) with Powerflex poly bushes...
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As Aebous said, the steering is improved - but I am astonished at how much better, think it's back to levels of sharpness with run flats. Bumps are felt a little more, but it's not crashy like the RFTs.

My car has done about 66k miles now, but the front wishbone rear bushes were changed (for OEM) a little over a year / 12k miles ago - ironically finished off the originals on the Aebous Meet :driving: When these were changed I was on non-RFTs and it simply removed the vibration I was getting, no marked improvement in feel. I should add, I do have a strut brace - which makes a difference with the turn in feel, there may be a cumulative affect. I don't know.

Now really looking forward to getting my M wheels back on.
 
PawnSacrifice said:
was informed the standard BMW ones aren't as good as they should be, as with the springs / OEM run flats it is one of the few things BMW hasn't got right.
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That's exactly what I got told too.

My understanding of it is that the OEM bushes are huge lumps of soft(ish) rubber, designed to isolate the driver from vibrations and improve ride comfort and perception of quality. Of course, that doesn't suit a sports car! The forum member "Curtis" was great at helping me understand all this, he had a LOT of experimentation with the suspension on his Alpina (now owned by another forum member).

Using that above diagram as a guide, I had bushes number 1, 2 and 3 replaced with poly bushes - no difference in ride quality or comfort, but them my originals had covered less that 25k miles before replacement. I did this BEFORE having my first proper alignment done - my local alignment guy was of the opinion the original bushes allow a lot of variance in suspension geometry (particularly if worn) due to the bushes deforming. Poly bushes deform less hence provide more reliable geometry. That's probably total overkill for road driving but what the hell, I did it anyway :oops:

Bushes from the E46 M3 are another option instead of poly bushes, apparently...
 
Interesting in that I have replaced my front rear bushes with poly and am seriously considering swapping them out when I replace all the wishbones. I have the top flight 2 part yellow with purple inners and have an issue in that they groan over low speed bumps.

The OEM come in for a lot of criticism, but they are a high complex rubber bushed filled with oil that does a pretty good job for a road car of holding the arm and reducing transmitted noise. Problem is once worn the oil can leak out and they become very sloppy.

Guess it's a compromise of what you want to achieve. Will investigate the E46 M3 bush idea though :thumbsup:
 
cj10jeeper said:
Interesting in that I have replaced my front rear bushes with poly and am seriously considering swapping them out when I replace all the wishbones. I have the top flight 2 part yellow with purple inners and have an issue in that they groan over low speed bumps.
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That is interesting - when I was talking to the chap at Grosvenor about the bushes they used he did mention an alternative to Powerflex, which were yellow, but they wouldn't use them any more. I don't recall the brand as I was overdosing on cynicism at the time! When I discussed the Powerflex originally he did say that they would warranty them, I think for 5 years - the manufacturer provide that warranty so the labour would be free.

Like you say, I think these things are a compromise / balancing act between comfort, durability and feel. A lot of it is personal preference too. If it wasn't for the fact that they'd told me not to go for something more expensive I'd never have given this a try in the first place. I am only on day 2, so my opinion may change.

Reference the M3 ones, I'd be interested if someone gives that a go. The same chap I spoke to has an E46 M3, he's changed his bushes for the Powerflex ones.
 
It was my local aligmnent guy who mentioned the M3 bushes, but was after I'd bought the poly ones. I've got no reason to doubt him though but would certainly be worth investigating for sizes/compatibility should anyone be interested in changing their OEm bushes.

Actually, it might've been Curtis that mentioned them too, but I don't have a record of the communication between me and him to check back...
 
I didn't actually qualify why he's change his M3 bushes to Powerflex, it may have just been a longevity thing, rather than to upgrade the feel - in much the same way that certain well respected forum members (and Nosa) ditched their OEM springs for Eibach due to a history of poor quality.

It would make sense that the M3 bushes would be firmer.
 
PawnSacrifice said:
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Does anybody know what would be the estimated cost to replace the bushes?
1) OEM bushes (1,2,3,4) and Poly Bushes (1,2,3,4)
2) Labour cost? (est. time required) if going Indy?

Thanks!
 
Not sure to be honest - I only had 1 done on mine. Can't remember the cost for OEM. The parts are easy enough to price online - for OEM just look up the part nos on RealOEM and put them into Cooper BMW Parts for a worst case scenario.

I doubt anyone has done the lot in one go, certainly not OEM - looks like A11y came closest. It won't be cheap as they're fiddly jobs, ie a bit to dismantle to get at them. If you have a local indy you trust just give them a call.
 
Off the top of my head, I paid around £170 for the fitting of all the bushes, including a full 4-wheel alignment afterwards - pretty good value IMO as the mechanic said it took around 5hrs and it's not his main line of work (the same bloke I always use for alignments).

And IIRC the bushes were around £100 all in. I got mine from motorsportworld online.
 
a11y said:
Off the top of my head, I paid around £170 for the fitting of all the bushes, including a full 4-wheel alignment afterwards - pretty good value IMO as the mechanic said it took around 5hrs and it's not his main line of work (the same bloke I always use for alignments).

And IIRC the bushes were around £100 all in. I got mine from motorsportworld online.
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Was that for the set of 4? If so that was a very good price as its £155+ on the motorsportworld website.
1) FRONT WISHBONE REAR BUSH X 2
2) FRONT ANTI ROLL BAR BUSH X 2
3) REAR TRAILING ARM BUSH X 2
4) REAR ANTI ROLL BAR BUSH X 2

Time for a group buy??
 
Ah, just had to check back HERE to see exactly what I bought: I didn't replace the full lot. I got the following:
- front wishbone rear bush (part 1 in that previous diagram)
- rear trailing arm bush (part 3)

I paid around £75 apparently although that was over 2 years ago that I actually bought the bits. I didn't touch the anti-roll bar bushes as my Z4's not covered many miles so wear wasn't an issue, and the advice I followed was purely focussing on reducing movement in the suspension to allow more consistent geometry through it's travel. Again probably overkill for road use but hey who cares :lol:
 
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