I took my 1997 Civic DX in for it's 75,000-mile checkup a few months ago and was told, among other things, that the rear trailing arm bushings are damaged and "pose a safety hazard". This notice, along with a few others, as well as an exorbitant price to get all the problems with the car repaired and an incorrect diagnostic on the car's electrical system has made me seriously consider doing all future repairs on vehicles myself.

I'm not all that mechanically-inclined yet: I'm sort of using my 91 CRX DX as a guinea pig to learn this stuff on, but I'm a heck of a long way from structural components. So as such, I ask this: What is a trailing arm bushing? What does it do? Is it truly a critical component? Does it actually pose a danger when damaged? -- and, last but not least -- Is it plausible, cheap, and practical to replace on my own?

I ask the final part because of the price they wanted to charge me for their replacement, which ended up being something over 1000 dollars. I simply cannot bring myself to pay that much money for a bushing. They told me there is a whole lot of labor involved however, so I'm guessing we're looking at something hard to get to? I'd appreciate any input on the matter.

 

From what I've seen, the trailing arm bushings do tend to go bad on Civics. They're only like $40 from Honda... I can't believe they're claiming $900+ labor for them. There is absolutely no way there's 18 hours labor in that, or even 9 hours for someone who knows what they're doing.

Yes, they are fairly critical. They are one of the points that hold the rear suspension on the car.

To inspect them yourself, get under the car, look at the inside of the rear wheel, then follow the big metal piece (the trailing arm) towards the front of the car. The bushings are a large rubber circle thing where the trailing arm bolts up to the car.

They are somewhat of a pain to replace, especially depending on how rusted your rear suspension is and whether you have air tools. You have to get the trailing arms off (obviously), and then changing the bushings requires either a hydraulic press or a special tool. Then you should have the car aligned when you put it all back together.

I know I saw a how to on here not long ago, but I can't find it now.

Another quick fix option may be (I've never tried this, but I've heard of it) filling the torn bushing with 3M window weld, which is polyurethane. I know people do it on motor mount bushings with good results.

 

Take pictures of the said bushing or take it to a Honda dealer and have them look at it. Most Honda trailing arm bushings have a coating the flakes off and looks like the bushing is falling apart when in reality it's fine. Only way to know for sure is to have another person inspect it.

 

i think honda pays 4 hours a side on them. but if you have the special tool it takes about 45 mins a side. that is how we make our living. you should get a free alignment with that. that is how we do it here.

 

someone wrote up a great DIY thread on replacing these the tool used is very slick. I think why they charge so much to do it is because they base their times off of all data and all data gets their prices by having a technician do the work but with hand tools no power/ air tools and for the trailing arm bushings the all data tech probably had to take the entire trailing arm off and use a press to get the bushing out and then press the new one in, but they have a specialty tool now which allows you to replace them with out taking the trailing arm off

here is the DIY link for replacing them.

https://honda-tech.com/zerothread?id=1589298

 

TA bushings are one of the few things I usually don't do myself. I actually have my car in getting new trailing arm bushings right now. I think I'm paying under $300 labor for them and a bunch of other miscellaneous rear suspension work.

 

Be careful with that extractor, as it can distort the rear arm.

I've done hundreds of RTA's- have them down to under 10 minutes a side. I use a pole jack and a special driver and use a hammer to drive them out

 

it use to be 4hrs for both sides but just recently they changed it to 3hrs for both...very common on 96-00 civics...

 

here you go
https://honda-tech.com/zerothread?id=1589298

I bought the tool on ebay for about 130, its worth having, i have yet to use it because at the moment i have a hole in my exhaust that has to be fixed, but i orginally took my trailing arms off and brought them to the shop to get pressed they charged me like 20 bucks to press them in plus the 80 bucks for the new bushing, if you get the tool it will almost equal the same price, but minus the *** load of work you have to do to remove the trailing arm, the DIY posted should get you through it fairly easy. hope this helped.

 

I really appreciate all the help, guys. All the information has helped me understand a lot about these little things -- and heck -- about the whole rear end of the car! The DIY write-up looks really complete and the repair looks a lot more simple than I thought.

It might be solely based on personal opinon, but do you think that picking up that bushing removal tool would be worth the limited use I might have for it? Or should I just take the extra time and precaution with the rear and do it with the standard set of tools that I have?

 

I think so you can always sell the tool to some one else that needs it and pretty much get your money back.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Unit44justin &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">I think so you can always sell the tool to some one else that needs it and pretty much get your money back.</TD></TR></TABLE>
thats true, if it cost $130 for the tool Im sure you could sell it in a snap on ebay for half. so you are really only out $65 for the tool.

 

if you like honda's and want to keep buying them, then its a great investment, when you do yours you can even offer to do it for your friends or people that you somewhat know for like 60 bucks, you can slowly make your money back, or just sell it after wards.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Berkut99 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">It might be solely based on personal opinon, but do you think that picking up that bushing removal tool would be worth the limited use I might have for it? Or should I just take the extra time and precaution with the rear and do it with the standard set of tools that I have?</TD></TR></TABLE>

I don't know how you can get those bushings out with a standard set of tools. They're in there very tight, and you're not going to get them by banging with a hammer or something.

What you COULD do, is remove the rear trailing arms and take them to a shop that has a press. They could remove them and throw the new ones in, and would probably charge you under $20 for it. Then you go put your trailing arms back on. I've had to do that for a few different parts, and if you find a good shop, they usually don't mind.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Vindicator9000 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">I don't know how you can get those bushings out with a standard set of tools. They're in there very tight, and you're not going to get them by banging with a hammer or something.</TD></TR></TABLE>

I don't know about 6th gens, maybe honda did something different with the trailing arms, but i've definately hammered bushings out of 5th gen trailing arms, i put them in the same way too, mine came out pretty easily too, getting them in is a little more of a challenge but still not that bad.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Vindicator9000 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

I don't know how you can get those bushings out with a standard set of tools. They're in there very tight, and you're not going to get them by banging with a hammer or something.

What you COULD do, is remove the rear trailing arms and take them to a shop that has a press. They could remove them and throw the new ones in, and would probably charge you under $20 for it. Then you go put your trailing arms back on. I've had to do that for a few different parts, and if you find a good shop, they usually don't mind.</TD></TR></TABLE>

hmmm

http://s263.photobucket.com/al...8.flv