Trailing Arm Removal

[3000GTPro]

I'm looking at how to remove my rear trailing arm so I can have the bushing replace, and I have noticed that I may have to remove the wheel bearing nut in the process. Has anyone successfully removed the assembly without removing the wheel hub assembly? I really don't want to touch that bearing nut if I don't need to.

edit: This is to be done on a 93 non-turbo

[Rakuny]

you don't have to touch that nut to remove the trailing arm. You just have to remove the 4 axle bolts, take the control arms off and the shock obviously. depending on what your mileage is I would say that while you have stuff apart it might actually be a good idea to replace the rear wheel bearings.. they seem to go around 150k

[3000GTPro]

Cool.
I have recently accumulated 202000 mi. on the car and never replaced those bearings yet. What else is recommended?

[Rakuny]

It really depends how far you want to go with it. I would definitely recommend new wheel bearings (there are 2 per trailing arm). and new dust shields for them might be a good idea depending on the condition of yours, the rubber on mine was disintegrated and I wasn't able to remove the bearings without wrecking the 2 metals ones (there are 3 shields per arm). All together the dust shields ran about $50 from Cherry hill.. I don't remember what the bearings were but I think it was just under $50 for all of them.

this is what I did with mine, hopefully some of the pics will give you an idea of whats involved.
http://www.3sgto.org/f2/rear-end-rebuild-7469.html

[anyonebutme]

step 1. lift car

step 2. Unbolts trailing arm forward bolt

step 3. lower front of trailing arm enough for bushing to clear subframe

step 4. use C press to push out old bushing and press in new one, if you're lucky. If unlucky, a porta-power hydraulic press makes quick work of it.

Other option is to unbolt it at the balljoints and keep the e-brake assembly with the arm, disconnecting it via the front adjusters under the center console.

[Rakuny]

what is a C press?
I didn't think about the e-brake cable.. the drivers side would be easy to disconnect under the center console, and the bolt under the tunnel is accessible.. the passenger side is not, the drive shaft carrier bearing blocks the bolt

[anyonebutme]

ball joint press. There's larger versions out there.

http://www.frontiernet.net/~slray/04F250/BallJoints/BallJointPress-02.JPG

the real tool for the job looks like this:

http://www.williammaloney.com/LandRover/VolvoBushings/VolvoTrailingArmBushingTool.jpg

[3000GTPro]

Oh, my car is 93 non-turbo by the way. So there wont be as much that needs to be replaced, right?

[anyonebutme]

never done a non-turbo, can't help.

[Rakuny]

ah me either, sorry.

[3000GTPro]

Thank you for your help anyway "anyonebutme" and "Rakuny"! I'm hoping there is someone out there who will know.

[B-Man]

IIRC the rears are hubs assemblies like the fronts on AWD. Should be 4 bolts that hold it to the knuckle. Almost nothing to it. Should look similar to this:

http://www.3sx.com/store/catalog/stock-hub-bearing-awd-front-mr223993-04-400l.jpg

No need to remove the trailing arm.

[3000GTPro]

It doesn't look like non-turbo cars are setup that way. Would you elaborate why I don't need to remove the trailing arm?

[B-Man]

If it's a hub assembly, it just comes off with 4 bolts, not a press.

[anyonebutme]

If it's a hub assembly, it just comes off with 4 bolts, not a press.

He wants to replace a bushing, not the bearings.

[B-Man]

Ooooh, I should read closer. All that talk of the wheel hub nut, etc threw me off. What bushing are we talking? The front trailing arm bushing?

EDIT: only one bushing, duh. Still no need to take that nut off. You should be able to do it by just dropping the front down and burning the bushing out.

[3000GTPro]

I am planning to have it pressed out for me, so I need to remove the arm one way or another. Maybe even replace the wheel bearings considering I have started going past 200,000 miles.

[3000GTPro]

This is what I have:http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i313/degamer/8c83f157.jpg

[a2j]

how did it go? I'm doing the same now.
What if I won't be able to get bushing out myself? I'll have to take it all apart, like in that picture above?

[3000GTPro]

Sorry for the late reply!
It went well except for one hitch...,my toe arm on my passenger side is making a clunking/popping sound, which I will ask for help about in a new thread.

It seems the only way you can remove the arm and take it to a shop (only on a non-turbo), without removing the that large hub nut, is to remove the arm with the bearing assembly, and handbrake cables attached.

Take off the brake calipers, brake caliper brackets, and brake rotors, and then proceed to loosen the bolts to remove the camber and toe arms, upper arm, trailing arm, and shock absorber at the knuckle. I don't know about the speed sensor since I don't have ABS, but it doesn't look like much of a challenge from here. I also suggest replacing the upper arm bushings at this time as well. If I had started with the knowledge I have now from my experience, I think I could have done the job within 5 days.

A heads up about that upper arm also. There isn't enough space to fit a 22mm+ socket to undue the upper arm nut at the knuckle. What I did for this is mark a line on the side of the balljoint threads and the nut for a visual cue while torquing it back down since I wasn't able to use a torque wrench.