These are on the money for the radiator/core support! energy suspension universal, body bushing p/n 9.4102 I know others have expressed this but I just want to confirm this for any one who may have some doubts!

I just ordered mine and received them heres a pic comparing the old and new.

sorry here is the photo

[img:left][/img]

I recently replaced #1 bushing with the poly bushing (part number and idea supplied by Darius). What I noticed was that it took a little finagling to get the bolt good and tight. The result was what feels like a tighter front end(meaning in the air the whole front end was less likely to move side to side when pressure was applied on one side). The ride was not changed much in my opinion, but the sharpness of turns was evident after a few turns. For what it's worth this was a easy and inexpensive upgrade/experiment.
Next up...I just recieve the GNX bushing set listed on gbodyparts.com will posts overall results when done.

Is there a noticeable difference in running Delrin vs PU body bushing for the #1 location? I currently have rubber on all locations for both cars, thinking of trying a more solid bushing at #1 and the PU bushings are more more "user friendly" that they are bolt in ready, whereas Delrin appears I would need to find a proper size peice and do some trimming, etc.

Not sure if anyone has used these but I ran across them and thought I'd put it out there...

http://www.opgi.com/p/suspension/24933/130/L240670.html

I plan on doing the body bushings this weekend and would like to buy the correct hardware as well. Is there a source that supplies all new hardware and everything I will need. I am choosing to do the PU bushing in the #1 and #7 locations and all factory Grand Prix bushings in the other locations as well as the GNX bushing. My car has stiffer tires, stock ride height and springs, and Grand Prix chassis bracing. I hope this has the ride quality I am looking for.

Will I be able to install the GNX bushings without issue? Or are these not necessary?

Did you leave the "cup" under the actual bushing?

I planned on doing my bodymounts in a weekend too.....here I am 3weeks later with my body up in the air still welding it all back together after almost every bolt snapped and found more of the frame/body rotting than I had previously thought. I wish you better luck than I had with my job!

The OPGI kit does not include the radiator support bushing. Energy Suspensions kit does not include as either but is less than 1/2 the price.

I purchased Energy Suspension kit 3.4141R and it had all the body bushings including the Radiator core support bushings.



I sat on this kit for a while after I purchased as I was reluctant to dive in because of the horror stories of broken bolts etc.

The good: It took me about 4 hours in my garage and that was with taking breaks and moving at a laxed pace.

The Bad: The passenger Rear bushing mount (which is nothing more than a threaded insert in the body that is given enough room to move for bolt alignment but not enough to rotate so as to allow the bolt to loosen and tighten up) lost its hold and was allowing the bolt to spin. As such I replaced all the others and left this one for last.

It was clear to me what needed to be done so I made some basic top to bottom calculations on where the mount would be, took a small hole saw and made an opening right above the mount.



You can't see it from the image but the grey insert that the bolt goes through has a flat edge where I had a friend press a screwdriver hard against to keep it from rotating, used a light duty 3/8 impact to work it forward and backward and Voila!!



In hindsight I probably could have avoided this if I would have stuck with the light duty impact and worked it forward and back several times. What got me in trouble was when I took my 1/2" Impact and just said damn the torpedoes! Thats when the insert broke free and I had no choice

Everyone, including the instructions, say to blast the bushings bolts with plenty of penetrating oil.



However, the reality is none of it really gets where it needs to be unless you want to drill a bunch of holes ( as some have mentioned on this site) in the body, strategically above each hole. It wasnt until I opened the hole in the trunk that I was able to get the oil where it was supposed to be as its too far up and not open at all to allow what you spray at it to do any good. So unless your willing to drill holes I personally wouldnt waste my time.

I have heard many say that using an impact is taboo. I respectfully disagree. The key I believe is not to use an impact made to throw King Kong off your car but rather use a light duty 3/8 adjustable force impact, dial it back and let it do the work of breaking free several years of corrosion. Again, in hindsight, moving it back an forth if you get one stuck like I did, taking your time and not using the Gorilla impact like I did on the last one and you will be fine.

The Ugly: Since my car is 26 years old (1986 SS)I knew the bushings were going to be bad but it wasnt until I took them out I saw just how bad. They were like Powdered Toast (Man) http://mcooki.es/55756 (Wow! It tastes just like Saw Dust!) Sorry, big Ren and Stimpy fan.




The car rides a 100% better than before and rightly so as I was basically riding on bolts fastened to the frame with little to no cushion.

Is it better than new stock or other bushings? I dont know as I wasnt going to spend the money to find out, especially since my car is heavily modified anyway. But I am very satisfied with the end result as it made a huge difference in the ride quality and gave me more body clearance for my LS powerplant.

Forgot to mention a couple things.

First off, if your going to replace the bushings then get yourself a new set of bolts. I scored mine from Mikes Monte.

Fast shipping and competitive price.



There is another vendor that offeres a value set for less but I noticed that they were not tapered at the end like the originals which might make for a tougher time getting it started so I opted for ones that mirror the originals.

These were the worst out of the bunch as you can see close towards the head of the bolts was rotted away. The middle one is most noticable in the photo.



This is the bushing that the middle bolt came out of. Wasted away.




And this is the pile of debris that was sitting inside the bushing.





One thing to consider when assessing this job for potential problems is the overall condition of the body and frame.

In short, even though my 86K + Monte was cared for before I purchased it, body panels and frame solid, there was still quite a bit of rot on the bushings and the bolts. In short, if there is more visible rot on the exterior, chances are your going to see more in these areas, and potentially more problems as well.

Mine is an 86 with the same cup in the front bushings. Per the example you are refering to, replacing the stock with an Energy Suspension bushing, you will not re-use the stock cup.

This will be clear to you once you have them in hand but from the image that you were refering to you can see that the Energy metal insert (colored brass on the energy bushing) is a different ID (I cant recall the OD) but it was quite clear that you were not going to re-use the cup, with integrated insert, to replace the insert that was instructed to be used with the Energy suspension bushing.




Also, for what its worth, I replaced the Rad support bushings first and took a test drive.

To me it did not make much of a difference. (Yawn)

It wasnt until I replaced them all that it made a marked improvement to the ride quality.

Good luck to all that take on this project as to me it was well worth the effort.

Question of the day - how do I get poly bushings for JUST position 7?

Might give energy suspension a call as the #7 position bushing is the same as the 2,4, and 6 bushings.

Actually, position 1 is the same as well.. I simply forgot that they just flip it the other way for position 1 but its the exact same part numbers referenced in the diagram (4134, 4133 poly pieces) with the same sleeve and washers as well.

If I recall they did offer this bushing for sale separately as someone had mentioned previously that they had scored it just for position 1 from Energy.

If thats a bust you may just have to bite the bullet, get the kit and use what you need.

I used this kit from PST;
http://www.p-s-t.com/s.nl/it.A/id.7004/.f?sc=12
This kit included ALL the bushings for every position,including the rad core and # 5 over the rear wheel well.I had to replace a couple of bolts,but I was lucky the local deisel truck repair shop had the ones I needed.In hindsight,I would have got a new set from one of the vendors that sell them.I followed some of the info in this article;
http://www.gnttype.org/techarea/bodygauges/bushings.html
I couldnt push up on the lip under the door area because of the ground effects kit on my car,so I pushed up on the floor area using either a peice of wood or metal,whichever fit better,to keep the floor from flexing too much.The # 5 bushing has a "lip" that is press fit into the hole it sits in,I found it easier to gae a broom handle,etc.,and push it out of the hole from the bottom,and to replace it go up and over the rear frame from the front.It took longer than I thought it would because of 3 bad spots that needed patches made and welded in.Mark had large washers with the right size center holes,but it was time consuming to trim them to fit the holes as he butt welded them in.If it hadnt been for that and one broken bolt it probably could have been done in a day.But I'm glad its done,I've only been for a short 1/2 hour drive and the Monte feels tighter and theres no rattles when hitting bad spots in the road.I'll have a better opinion on this after the Atlantic Nationals coming up next week,thats our long highway trip for the summer.I bought the PST kit on the recommendation of Mark at SC&C,and so far I've got no complaints.
Guy
Guy

Sorry for my late reply... Mondotti is correct. I didn't use the cups. You do get these thick washers and it all lines up and is nice and tight.

I will admit I skimmed the post looking but I have a problem that got me scratchig my head. My front #1 bushings are not the best but I could resued them after taking my front cap off. However, when putting them back on starting from top to bottom. Nut->Washer-> top rubber bushing->car body->cup bushing->cup-> washer->Frame->washer->bolt. I have a nice gap between the bushing rubbers as if there should be something else to take up the space. I will admit my first time doing this. I am sorry if this anwser was some where up in the post but I did not see it. only someone talking about gap betwen cup and frame.

Are you sure you didnt have a gap before you started? When I changed my 26 year old wasted front bushings (the one pictured in my previous post is from my 86) there was a decent gap already there. Additionally one thing I didnt mention you should do after replacing your bushings is that you should check and then shim all the bushings appropriately as to fill any gaps at rest before torquing.

Per the instructions from energy, they state to use the factory shims with the new shims they give you. IIRC, at rest, I used the two that were there plus the bushing washer they include in the kit.

I hope this helps.

Hi Folks,

I haven't visited this sticky in a long time, but I see that the most recent discussion has trended toward using TPU bushings everywhere. Some time ago PB86SS/87LS asked:

"Is there a noticeable difference in running Delrin vs PU body bushing for the #1 location? I currently have rubber on all locations for both cars, thinking of trying a more solid bushing at #1 and the PU bushings are more more 'user friendly' that they are bolt in ready, whereas Delrin appears I would need to find a proper size peice and do some trimming, etc."

I think I mentioned some time back that I progressed from trying:
1. OEM rubber (old), to:
2. TPU (new), to:
3. Delrin (new) to:
4. OEM rubber (new), to:
5. TPU (new), to:
6. Delrin (new), at the #1 location.

After first trying Delrin, I wanted to confirm my suspicion that there really was a big difference in ride quality and subjective sense of front-end "tightness" in stepping-up from TPU to Delrin, so I repeated the process and drove the car studiously at each step, especially noting behavior over very bumpy surfaces.

And the confirmation was abundant. Delrin makes a big improvement over polyurethane. And OEM rubber is completely intolerable to me: the front end jiggles like a bowl of overcooked spaghetti. After seeing the video that Schwartz performance posted which showed just how amazingly floppy the unsupported OEM frame is, it is now easier for me to believe how important it is to get the fenders to lend front-end rigidity to the A/G body platform.

Disclaimer: Again, the perception of NVH and front-end "tightness" is very subjective. Furthermore, it's strongly influenced by the stiffness of the tires, springs, and shocks. If we were still using the low-performance, preposterously soft-riding (by today's standards) tires of the '70's and '80's, I'd suspect that choice of bushing material at the #1 location would be almost immaterial. But modern springs/shocks/tires (especially tires) are far stiffer. The stiffer these components are, the stiffer the chassis needs to be, and therefore the greater the benefit a solid bushing like Delrin can create for our cars.

Best,
MAP

Thanks for the insights MAP. I still want to replace the #1 with delrin. All in due time.

After replacing my body mount bushings, I was alarmed by a major design flaw in them. The GM factory body bushings have a sheetmetal insert molded into them that rusts out before the rubber rots. On all my old body bushings the molded in inserts were badly rusted, one bushing's insert was completely disintegrated into rust powder, leaving the bushing hollow. This rust powder from the rusting inserts becomes trapped between the bushings and the frame, rotting the frame mounts out. This is a major design flaw, one I am surprised no one else has seemed to pick up on. This makes me really glad about replacing the mounts with aftermarket poly mounts since they do not have a stupid inserts in them to rust out. The stock body bushing design is so bad, probably every G body should have their rubber bushings replaced with poly to save them from frame rot, even mint G bodies.

Hello
Anybody knows if there is a difference in stiffness between a poly urethane bushing and a poly graphite bushing like the ones listed above. I have a t-top so I am very concerned about over stiffness in the body.

Great sticky !
Regards

Here's another read for you on body bushings. Did mine a year ago, can say they are harsher than the worn out rubber bushings, but tolerable.
http://www.montecarloss.com/community/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=960081&page=1

I was told by Energy that the red and black have the same durometer. Never tested the reds for durometer, only the blacks.

Last page of this post has testing I did on hardness of blacks and rubber.
Bob

Most of you probably already know this but Energy Suspension also makes a firmer poly bushing. Supposedly the standard black bushing is 70A Durometer.
Their firm bushing is rated at 80A.

I only found this while looking at bushings for the #1 area.
Energy suspension
9.4102G (Soft)
9.4101G (Firm)

Interesting to note that the ratings I've seen for Prothane are 88A Durometer.