E30 Zone

I'm having problems fitting these.Fitted the rear beam bushes last week no problem.Today thought I'd fit the trailing arm bushes dry fitted the steel sleeve to the bushes slipped on quite easy,took it apart pushed the two haves of the rubber bush into the trailing arm both went in with hand pressure,so smeered the grease on and thought I'd push them in by hand,this is when the problem started they just won't push all the way home.So put it in a vice and slowly clamped them together,still no joy.To cut a long story short I tryed loads of grease same again with no grease,with washing up liquid still won't have it,still will not go home.Even a pulley made up a nut and bolt one if you know what I mean.Here's a couple of pics.



That's the best I can get it,in the 3rd picture if I tighten it up it looks ok but as soon as you undo it,it goes back to how it is in the picture.Has anyone else had this problem?So any help would be appreciated.
Roy.

did you check for powder coating or paint (not sure how you've done the arm) in the hole?

I had this problem. The silicone expands/compresses when you fit it into the arm and causes the bushes to swell out of the ends. The secret is to get it so that the bushes are hanging out the same each side by only a few mm. This is possible with a lot of pressing and fiddling.

Make sure the inner recesses of the arm are spotless clean and shiny and use lots of lubricant.

Even with the bushes out a few mm you can fit them into the subframe with a push.

HTH.

Thanks for your replies.Had another go today
Jhonno the trailing arms are all clean inside and smooth.
This is what I done today

Decided to try this pushed the bushes in tight plenty of grease on the shaft and pulled them in slowly.

Here goes

Ok so far

Still ok

Still going in ok half a turn at a time.

It's starting to swell.

Pointing with the screw driver at where it's started to push the bush out.

Undone the nuts and you can see the gap.

Put some washes over the sleeve to try and push the bushes back in and gave it a few turns.

When I undone the nuts the gap came back.You cannot get the bushes to go in.

You can see the gap in the centre and that's as much as you are aloud each side if you see what I mean.

See the metal sleeve is a tight fit,if you see the gap in the middle in the other pic if they were to overhang that much each side I could possibly push them in but I cannot get even close to it.Did try lots of other ways this is just one way I have done it but all the others gave the same results
I totally p***** off now, powerflex say you don't need a special tool to do it.
old_skool_2002,did what you said but still no joy thanks for your help lads.
I'm not going to give up.
The trailing arms are on the floor and bushes are back in box.

I would shave some more material from the centre of the bushes as thats whats causing them to push appart.

I would say 2mm from each half of the bush to start with.

Why are you fitting these anyway?

Andrew

I fitted these to my car and had the same problems. Powerflex say that they are easy to fit. It would be easier to eat them! I ground off a few millimetres of each bush and used window cleaner as a lubricant and they fitted. The standard ones are a simple fit by comparison.

Hi Andrew.The bushes needed renewing so I thought I'd use the powerflex ones instead of the standard BMW ones.Just didn't think I'd have this much trouble.Do you mean cut a piece off the end of the bush like in the pic?

Had thought of this do you think it will work?
So why don't powerflex make them shorter so they will fit in ok.
I have e-mailed them shall see if I hear anything after the weekend,or if not I shall phone them.
Are going to the pod tomorow?
cheers mate
Roy

Crikey, I thought I was the only one with this problem ....... I've had poly bushes in all the suspension and have done 4 track days ....... car handled really well until the end of a whole day at Cadwell Park when the rear tried to steer on the flat out left before Charlies going up the hill ...... quite scary and turned out to be that the poly bush on the outside of the off side trailing arm had disappeared altogether ..... the metal pin was still there but no sign of any plastic at all !!

I got another one and fitted it with trailing arm still in place ...... had to drop the beam for trailing arm bolt to clear the fuel filler hose (another time I would try removing the filler hose as getting the beam to re-seat on its poly bush wasn't easy). Anyway with both bolts removed the arm dropped down sufficiently to do the threaded bolt and nut trick as in the pictures above ...... my new polybush was a one piece affair and only had a shoulder on one end ........ it too, did the same as in the pics and would swell up rather than push into the eye of the arm.

I eventually got it to seat properly by using hose clamps around the bush (and plenty of lubricant) ...... fortunately I happened to have some quite narrow clamps for the last push as the normal wider ones end up fouling.

What I planned as less than an hours work took at least three to replace just one bush !!

By the way ..... the supplier of the bushes gave me the replacement free of charge and added that "someone" had gotten the poly mixture wrong with one batch and they were doing the same disappearing act as mine ...... what about my other 3 ................ different batch ????

CHEERS
MARK