Rear A frame poly bushes

[MartinH]

On my S3/4 Elan I've removed the old bushes and had new poly bushes pressed in. When I offer these up to the car there is no way they will fit into the chassis, the bushes are far too wide.
The chassis is an old spyder space frame and the bushes were bought from Paul Matty. Reading some of the older threads on here seems to suggest that there should only be a top hat on one side. The bush sets I bought have the top hat on both sides. Should I trim one side? Even if I do this I don't think these will fit the car still too wide.

Any guidance gratefully received. At this rate I wont be making it to Castle Combe for the track day on Saturday

Thanks
Martin

[Foxie]

Don't fit bushes with a "top hat" on one side only.

Don't trim one side only.

Measure your chassis trunnion spacing. Measure your wishbone inner pivot length. Compare. The answer will tell you if the bushes will not fit at all (unlikely) , or it will tell you how much material need to be machined off each top hat.

[MarkDa]

Have you checked the length of the SS sleeve?
This should be a tight fit between the flanges, which are c75 mm apart - presumably 3" in real money.
The bush should be just a touch shorter to allow it to work, which is by moving around the sleeve like a bearing.
The wishbone ends are 63mm wide so there's plenty of room for a decent thickness of top hat to provide longitudinal compliance.
If they don't measure to factory spec then I'd say the bushes are wrong and ask Matty to supply the right ones.

[terryp]

I can remember fitting mine and they were a mega tight fit. I used a cramp to squeeze then down to the size of the inner, lubricate with the supplied grease and then gently push home , releasing the cramp.

Terry

[MartinH]

Thanks for the advice guys.

Have now found the cause of the problem. The people who pressed out the old bushes did not take out the outer sleeve, so when pressing in new bushes and the SS sleeve it was nigh on impossible to get them in and fit into the chassis. Hopefully they will now fit.

Martin

[Foxie]

[MarkDa]

Glad you got it sorted.
I guess we should have twigged it when you said the pu bushes were pressed in as they should have gone in with a little lubricant and a simple vice.
Hopefully the wishbones will now go in reasonably easily now.