Ed's Pressing Question

["Jay Mackro" <jmackro@domain.elided>]

Ed Lutz <edlutz@domain.elided> had asked an interesting question:

>I am wondering about the rear trailing arms. All the write-ups I have seen
>say to burn and cut the bushings out. Is this because they are in so
>tight using a press will generally damage the trailing arm, or is the
>burn and cut method recommended since most people don't have a press
>available.

I replaced my bushings recently, and I used the drill and cut method to
take out the old ones.  Man, what a chore!  Drilling out the rubber
was a real pain (yea, burning would have been easier, but burning
in California in the fall is a no-no.  No doubt my neighbors would 
have smelled the smoke, and called 911 + the EPA.)  Then,
carefully hacksawing two cuts through the outer ring (if you haven't
done this yourself, it won't be obvious why TWO cuts are required -
I'm too lazy to type that much detail, but trust me, unless you really
want hacksaw scars in your trailing arms, you need to slice the
bushing twice.  Hint - a chisel gets involved).

OK, so I got the old ones out with just stone age tools.  But, how to
get the new ones in?  I sort of doubted that a vise would apply enough
oomph, and certainly didn't want to beat them in.  So, I went to my
local Harbor Freight, bought a nifty hydraulic press for $60, and 
pressed in the new bushings.  Yea, a machine shop probably would
have done the whole job for $60, but I figure I'll use the press with
some regularity in the future.

So, here's my follow-on question:  How much harder is it to press
out old, rusted-in-place bushings, than to press in new ones that
have been lubricated with Never-Seize?  Ie, if I had bought the 
press at the outset of the project, could I have just pushed out the
old ones, and avoided all the drilling, hacksawing, chiseling, and
hammering?  Of course, to have done this, I would have had to
rig up some mandrels in the appropriate diameter.  (pressing new
bushings in takes fewer set-up pieces than pushing the old ones
out - again, I'm too lazy to type an explaination of why, but the
hint is to think of where the old bushing is going to go while you
are pushing it out, and what will support the trailing arm while this
is happening).

Jay Mackro
'66 Giulia Sprint GT
the 

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