To replace the strut rod bushings first remove the big nut from the front of the strut rod by hand, do not use an impact gun. Then remove the nuts from the bottom of the control arms and separate rod from arm (you may not need to remove the rod from the arm, I did mine while rebuilding the front suspension). Pull the rod out and repllace the bushing, reassemble in reverse order of disassembly by hand and take vehicle for alignment.
I also would like to know how to change the bushings. Removing the rod was easy enough....however....getting the bushings out of their mounts is another story. How actually is that done, from the front, the back combination of the two? Do they pry out? They certainly do not come out easily.
I had to take a hammer and chisel to one of my bushing sleeves. The other side came out without too much trouble
strut rod bushing replacement Thanks to the forum and some private messages from a couple of forum members I got the bushings out of the frame. It turns out to be very easy. First remove the 1" nuts from the front of the strut rod. Second remove the two nuts holding the bars to the lower control arms and pull the rods out of the bushings. Now is where I got hung up as the bushings would not pull out of the frame. Upon inspection one will see that there are two sleeves running through the center of the bushings. The inner sleeve is very thin metal and is either peened over or is crimped over when the nuts are tightened down upon the initial installation. What I did was to take a one inch drill bit and machined off the crimped over material at the front of the bushings. After removing a small amount of the inner sleeve, the outer washer fell off and the front rubber pulled off easily and a light tap with a hammer knocked the rear portion of the bushing out.
