rear trailing arm bushing replacement

[focus_mtl]

rear trailing arm bushing are showing significant wear at 60k.

can they be changed? How difficult using floor jack, stands and regular tools?

[thenorm]

they can be changed with a poly bushing (not sure about OEM)

it can be done with hand tools and jack stands, thats how i did it.

its probably on of the hardest bushings to swap. you have to remove the brake line and the ebrake cable to get the trailing arm completely free.
getiing the bushing out reuires a press and then a torch to burn the rest of the rubber out, and a wire wheel to clean it up. U have to reuse that metal cylinder and the centre pin.

if there is OEM replacemnt, you an probably omit that torch bit, and i imagine you wont need to reuse any metal bits.

[Cheffy]

Probably easiest to replace the entire arm with the bushing already pressed in. Poly bushings are not recommended for this arm due to reduction in flexibility of the control blades.

[focus_mtl]

Originally Posted by Cheffy

Probably easiest to replace the entire arm with the bushing already pressed in.

local ford parts counter doesn't stock the bushing anymore. They only stock the complete trailing arm with bushing pressed in.

according to the Ford parts guy.....Techs had a nightmare installing new bushing. Pressing out the old bushing would sometime damage the trailing arm or would require removing the complete trailing arm. It was faster and cheaper for them to install the new part. Also with the new bushing already at the proper angle, a wheel alignment wasn't necessary.

I would think a wheel alignment be necessary after changing the trailing arm. What do you all think?