Rear control arms

87 black gt · Aug 4, 2019

Pulling out my rear axle, which is a 8.8 and putting in 3:73's, keeping four lug axles, car will be used for street maybe one or two times at strip, should i stay with stock arms with new busings, or stock uppers and aftermarket lowers, or aftermarket upper and lowers any suggedtion will greatly be appreciated

revhead347 · Aug 4, 2019

If you have ever pressed in control arm bushings, the answer is obvious. Aftermarket control arms come with the bushings already pressed in. The extra $100 is worth the 5 hours, the bruises, and the number of swear words it requires to remove and press in a new bushing on a quarter century old control arm.

Kurt

Blown88GT · Aug 4, 2019

UCA & LCA with poly bushings. For the UCA, use the factory rubber ones that are on the diff. Most UCA's come this way.

87 black gt · Aug 4, 2019

revhead347 said:
If you have ever pressed in control arm bushings, the answer is obvious. Aftermarket control arms come with the bushings already pressed in. The extra $100 is worth the 5 hours, the bruises, and the number of swear words it requires to remove and press in a new bushing on a quarter century old control arm.

Kurt

I was looking at upr

revhead347 · Aug 4, 2019

87 black gt said:
I was looking at upr

UPR makes good stuff. There are plenty of quality manufacturers out there. You won't regret just replacing them instead of trying to press in new bushings.

Kurt

revhead347 · Aug 4, 2019

Blown88GT said:
UCA & LCA with poly bushings. For the UCA, use the factory rubber ones that are on the diff. Most UCA's come this way.

I have poly bushings in all 8 locations. If you lube them right, it isn't a problem. For the OP, just lather them up in red bearing grease, and wipe off the excess once the installation is complete. I have had the same poly bushings in 2 different Mustangs over a period of 21 years, and I have never had "binding" problems.

There is no such thing as a free lunch. The factory rubber ones provide better ride quality, the poly bushings are stiffer and last longer. It just depends on which is more important to you.

Kurt

Dom88LX · Aug 5, 2019

I am pulling my 8.8 currently and doing a gear swap as well (4.10's). I'll be replacing the UCA's and LCA's with non-adjustable tubular types with poly bushings, I think they're SR Performance off American Muscle. Looking at the thin, stamped flimsy LCA's that came stock on the car, these will be a nice improvement regardless of which brand/type you settle on. For the upper rear axle housing bushings I went with the factory replacement rubber.

Also +1 on pressing new bushings into the old control arms, pressing out those old upper axle housing bushings is enough of a pain to begin with!

Good luck and have fun!

Red50Fox · Oct 24, 2019

Hi all. Riding the coattails on this post. Going to be swapping out my 8.8 4 lug with an 8.8 5 lug this spring. I want to make this as easy as possible so I'm replacing bushings and control arms on the new axle before it goes in the car. My problem is what control arms to use. I don't want to use stock, i want to use some thing better with poly bushings. The car will only be street driven and occasionally driven hard (by my standards). I don't want to spend to much on this purchase as I'm going to be doing 5 lug front and rear with disks and gears in the new axle.

I know there's some opinions out there... Please share

Blown88GT · Oct 24, 2019

87 black gt said:
I was looking at upr

I have those. UPR is local to me.

Gs1987GT · Oct 25, 2019

The upper control arm bushings on the axle on my car need replaced. It's been 20 yrs since I did them before.

Any tips on pressing out the old and installing the new in the axle without damaging them? Thanks guys

Steel1 · Oct 25, 2019

Gs87GT said:
The upper control arm bushings on the axle on my car need replaced. It's been 20 yrs since I did them before.

Any tips on pressing out the old and installing the new in the axle without damaging them? Thanks guys

The sell a bushing removal/install tool for this, think you can get it through LMR.
I used and air hammer to beat out the old ones and the fancy tool for install.

Maximum Motorsports Mustang Rear Upper Axle Bushing Tool | 79-04

Replace axle housing bushings without having to remove your axle assembly from the car in very limited space with our 7.5 or 8.8 bushing removal tool (MMT-1).

lmr.com

Gs1987GT · Oct 25, 2019

Cool, thank you for the reply. That to look sort of similar to a ball joint press, I wonder if that would work? Or could be made to work? Thanks for the help

revhead347 · Oct 25, 2019

Dang they make a took for that now, so you "don't have to remove the axle from the car." I can't count how many times I have done those bushings without a tool, and never took the axle out of the car. The tool says it's out of stock right now. I just do the drill bit method. It's on youtube. Then clear out the rest with a wire wheel. Sometimes if they are really soft, you have to burn the remnants out. Just have something handy to put it out with, because you are not far from the fuel lines. It's pretty cool that there is a tool available for that now.

Kurt

Gs1987GT · Oct 26, 2019

Yeah. I used to just beat and crash em till I got them out. Going back in is what I would like a better method of. For $37 that's not bad. I agree

Red50Fox · Oct 26, 2019

It's a pretty solid tool. I have not used mine yet but it's well made and looks (from the videos) to be much easier than beating or burning. So while I'm here, any thoughts on replacement control arms? What's good / bad? As mentioned all street, no track, but sometimes driven hard (by my standards). I'd like to get opinions from the people that have some experience with these.

Please let me know.
Thanks

Rdub6 · Oct 26, 2019

From what I’ve seen and read..... stay away from the LMR / American Muscle house brands! I follow a guy on YouTube who had the SVE lowers for a short period of time, and the bushings were toast already!
I think it’s a “you get what you pay for” with suspension stuff.

Red50Fox · Oct 26, 2019

Rdub6, I understand what your saying. My issue is I don't know enough to know what are the house brands and what is a good brand. I'm willing to put some money into it because the last thing I want (or anyone else, I assume) is a failing suspension at any time. So if people have brands to stay away from to brands to look at that's what I'm interested in. Thanks

Rdub6 · Oct 26, 2019

SVE is LMR’s brand.
SR Performance is American Muscle’s
The general consensus is that Maximum Motorsports is the authority on suspension components, with quality, well made products!
They're not the cheapest, that’s for sure, but that’s where I’ll look first when I’m ready. I only want to do it once, so I plan to buy right.

Red50Fox · Oct 26, 2019

I'm hearing good things from folks here about Max Motorsport and UPR. I noticed that the Upper at MM is pretty much just a new Ford CA, but the lowers are different, the UPR ones do not have grease fittings (that I can see from the site) even though the desc of them indicates they do. I reached out to UPR support but have not heard back. Anyone know if they do have fittings?

Regarding Grease fittings, there is a lot of conversation about keeping these well greased. What about CAs from BBK or BMR, they show them with fittings. Should I be concerned about them having fittings? ( I seem to have used the word fittings a lot in this post...

Mustang5L5 · Oct 27, 2019

revhead347 said:
Dang they make a took for that now, so you "don't have to remove the axle from the car." I can't count how many times I have done those bushings without a tool, and never took the axle out of the car. The tool says it's out of stock right now. I just do the drill bit method. It's on youtube. Then clear out the rest with a wire wheel. Sometimes if they are really soft, you have to burn the remnants out. Just have something handy to put it out with, because you are not far from the fuel lines. It's pretty cool that there is a tool available for that now.

Kurt

That tools been around for a while now. When I did my rear axle back in 2009, I changed those bushings and used the tool. I thought it was pretty easy to use

Rear control arms

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Apparently my ex-husband made that mistake.

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Apparently my ex-husband made that mistake.

Apparently my ex-husband made that mistake.

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Mustang Master

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Apparently my ex-husband made that mistake.

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So while I wait to figure out my rear end issues

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So while I wait to figure out my rear end issues

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That is…until I whipped out my Bissell

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