Squeaky Sway Bar Bushings....

[sorka]

Well, more like a creaking popping sound as the sway bar turns far enough in the bushing to break the grab the rubber has and slip to the rotational low energy point.

Took several hours with the front wheel off jacked up and moving the car up and down on one corner before I finally tracked the popping to the actual sway bar bracket.

So does anyone know when before this starts happening, is it because the rubber bushing doesn't slip acting like the rotation bushing one one of the control arms? Or does the sway bar rotate freely within the bushing and it eventually starts to have less and less slip until the rubber grabs?

I suspect the latter since that's how sway bar bushings normally work.

The bushing bracket releases on one end so you can pry it open a little. Looking at the FSM procedure for removing the sway bar, you have to slide the bracket and bushing off the end of the sway bar, but it won't budge right now because the rubber is really grabbing the sway bar even after I pry the bracket open a half inch.

So tomorrow I'm going to use an 18 gauge grease needle(very thin) and silicon grease in a 6000 psi grease gun and inject grease between the bushings and sway bars while holding the bracket open as much as I can get without exceeding the brackets closed side spring rate.

Has anyone else had this issue and what did you do to fix it? The sound only happens when going slowly and going over something where the wheels don't stay level with each other. So not during normal driving. It is driving me nuts though.

 

[uscgreel]

Interested in this as well. I am trying to figure out one of my squeaks up there too, mine is more intermittent than yours though. I don't see why your method wouldn't work.

 

[sorka]

No more noisy bushings. I used an 18 gauge grease needle to inject silicon grease between the bushing and the sway bar. This required unbolting the bushing bracket and spreading it apart far enough to allow the needle to be squeezed in between the rubber and the sway bar.

One trick is to push on the needle gentle as you squirt the grease under pressure. This expands the rubber from the sway bar just slightly and allows the needle to slide in all the way.

I tried to get it all the way around but when I got it back together, the problem was actually worse. Rather than 1 or two pops from the rubber finally having too much rotational shear and settling to a lower energy state, it was now creaking badly. i.e. the bushing was now sliding more readily around the bar as the bar rotated but was still sticking enough to cause noise.

This was two weeks ago. Slowly but surely the noise squeak got quieter and quieter and finally vanished. I did both bushings and they are now completely quiet.

If anyone is interested, let me know and I'll post photos.

 

[Augustus]

Sorka,
Sounds like a nice fix. Are you still squeak free? I am definitely interested in seeing photos of your process.
Thank you.

No more noisy bushings. I used an 18 gauge grease needle to inject silicon grease between the bushing and the sway bar. This required unbolting the bushing bracket and spreading it apart far enough to allow the needle to be squeezed in between the rubber and the sway bar.

One trick is to push on the needle gentle as you squirt the grease under pressure. This expands the rubber from the sway bar just slightly and allows the needle to slide in all the way.

I tried to get it all the way around but when I got it back together, the problem was actually worse. Rather than 1 or two pops from the rubber finally having too much rotational shear and settling to a lower energy state, it was now creaking badly. i.e. the bushing was now sliding more readily around the bar as the bar rotated but was still sticking enough to cause noise.

This was two weeks ago. Slowly but surely the noise squeak got quieter and quieter and finally vanished. I did both bushings and they are now completely quiet.

If anyone is interested, let me know and I'll post photos.

 

[sorka]

Nope. It's back and just as bad as ever. I'm afraid the only real fix is to replace the entire sway bar. You can't buy the bushings separately. Perhaps you could get aftermarket bushings. Part of the problem is the existing rubber bushings expanded and are extremely tight. You'd pretty much have to destroy the brackets to get them off so an after market solution would require a new bracket along with the bushings.

 

[Augustus]

Well shucks. Thank you for your reply and update.