Rear suspension creaking

[Ian Comerford]

My rear suspension has started to creak in certain conditions.  It’s not much and it doesn’t happen during normal driving.  I rebuilt/refreshed all of the suspension 12 years ago and used Superpro bushes.  Is suspect that these may have dried out, hence the creaking (I could be wrong).  I’m about to head off to France for a 2.5 week touring holiday and would like to try a temporary fix.  I wonder if removing the end plates on either side that retain the axle arms would allow me to spray some silicone grease into the bushes?  Any thoughts please?

Emphasis is on temporary.

Thank you

Ian

[Chris T]

That is certainly what I would do. Then re-grease the ARB bushes (easy to do) and check drop links for condition, they do seem to fail regularly these days. Enjoy the trip.

[PeterK]

Just drive it so that the suspension goes through full travel & see if it goes away

Otherwise ...

Option 1 - earplugs & creaking goes away

Option 2 - spray silicone grease over & around every bush while someone bounces the car

 

If i was just about to travel, the last thing that I would want to risk is upsetting suspension geometry or finding an issuette / breaking a bolt.

 

If there’s a couple of weeks to go and the creaking was really annoying, then I'd pull the suspension & regrease properly.

Edited May 5, 2023 by PeterK
Typi

[SilverWT]

2 hours ago, PeterK said:

Just drive it so that the suspension goes through full travel & see if it goes away

^ This.

I had the same issue on the 3.2 when I started using it after the winter. Most noticeable over speed bumps. I was going to give it all a spray, but after a couple of hundred miles it is not noticeable anymore.

Mark

[Ian Comerford]

Thanks all for the responses and advice, it’s appreciated.  I use the car a lot so it’s not lack of use causing the issue, I’ve done over 11k miles in the last 18 months.  I’ve got time to get some grease in there so it seems to make sense  and I don’t believe that removing the end plates upsets any geometry, but thank you for the thought. 
So odo was fixed yesterday, jobs still do - engine oil and filter to change, rear suspension to grease and finally unstick the driver side flapper box which seems to be directing hot air to me which I don’t want in Provence in late May, early June.

Thank you again

Ian

[Jonny Hart]

Mine also had Superpro bushes 12 years ago.  The front now creaks over speed bumps and I use the car a lot.  Annoyingly you can't easily regrease the bushes at the rear of the front torsion bars.

Correct me if I'm wrong but I think the A arms have to come off to regrease,

[Ian Comerford]

It’s good to hear this isn’t uncommon Jonny, sorry! I think that with the end plates removed it will improve access so will see what is achievable.  I will report back

[Northy]

My superpro’s did exactly this on the rear. I tried to get some grease in there but it didn’t work (I used lithium grease) - maybe silicon or PTFE lube would penetrate enough? The cross hatching on the inside had worn out on mine and I had to replace them and get the geometry redone. Which was frustrating and expensive. 
 

The near side front does it over speed bumps in hot weather now.  

[Ian Comerford]

Oh dear, Superpros seemed like a good idea at the time didn’t they.

[sopor]

The SuperPro bushes on the front of my car creaked like mad and also were “stuck” with loads of stiction preventing movement. They were stripped down and regreased with the special gorilla snot lube as opposed to a more normal grease.

[Nige]

No problem here yet, installed over 12 years ago. Weird.  I did install them with lots of lithium grease though.

Edited May 7, 2023 by Nige

[tea boy]

My knees are creaking, any advice for that?

[PeterK]

More tea and sticky buns ?

[sopor]

polybronze bushes with grease nipples for the win

[Ian Comerford]

18 hours ago, sopor said:

polybronze bushes with grease nipples for the win

For a 100% road car, isn’t that a bit harsh/noisy?

On 06/05/2023 at 22:16, sopor said:

The SuperPro bushes on the front of my car creaked like mad and also were “stuck” with loads of stiction preventing movement. They were stripped down and regreased with the special gorilla snot lube as opposed to a more normal grease.

Do you have any idea of what the grease was, Googling ‘special gorillla snot lube’ doesn’t bring anything useful 😳

[sopor]

3 minutes ago, Ian Comerford said:

For a 100% road car, isn’t that a bit harsh/noisy?

Do you have any idea of what the grease was, Googling ‘special gorillla snot lube’ doesn’t bring anything useful 😳

I meant for the knees! 🤣

Not sure they’re any more harsh than superpro bushes and they have grease fittings to keep them lubricated and smooth.

On my car (SP72’s old steed) the front bushes had all but seized to the point where with the car on the lift you needed to do a pull up on the the A arms and to get them to go into full droop. Upon disassembly it was discovered that the A arms and brackets had thick powder coating where they interfaced with the bushes which made for too tight a fit. And it looked as though a conventional grease had been used. All done by  SVP. The gift that keeps giving.

Pretty sure the grease was this stuff https://bofiracing.co.uk/servicing/lubricants/greases/superpro-polyurethane-bushing-silicone-grease-sachet/ 

Incredibly sticky and quite viscous. Like you might imagine gorilla snot to be. Definitely unlike any conventional grease you might use on car.

 

[Ian Comerford]

17 minutes ago, sopor said:

I meant for the knees! 🤣

Not sure they’re any more harsh than superpro bushes and they have grease fittings to keep them lubricated and smooth.

On my car (SP72’s old steed) the front bushes had all but seized to the point where with the car on the lift you needed to do a pull up on the the A arms and to get them to go into full droop. Upon disassembly it was discovered that the A arms and brackets had thick powder coating where they interfaced with the bushes which made for too tight a fit. And it looked as though a conventional grease had been used. All done by  SVP. The gift that keeps giving.

Pretty sure the grease was this stuff https://bofiracing.co.uk/servicing/lubricants/greases/superpro-polyurethane-bushing-silicone-grease-sachet/ 

Incredibly sticky and quite viscous. Like you might imagine gorilla snot to be. Definitely unlike any conventional grease you might use on car.

 

Brilliant, thank you.  

[Henry]

I am hoping elephant racing rubber is the answer , mine has been in for 5 yrs , just hope its not that cheap rubbish rubber that lasts a fraction of the original .

[Phill]

1 hour ago, sopor said:

 All done by  SVP. The gift that keeps giving.

oooh, he who’s name must not be mentioned, hasn’t been mentioned in a long time 😂

 

 

[Leicestershire]

With the original suspension, the only moving part capable of causing squeaks is the anti-roll bar bushes as the metal bar rotates against the bush.

All the other bushes work like metalastic bushes where all the rotation is within the rubber – no real moving parts.

The original spring plates have the bushes vulcanised onto the steel – the flex in the rubber allows the rotation in the suspension. This also gave additional spring support to the torsion bars.

One supplier of bushes would supply a tube of superglue to bond the replacement bushes back onto the spring plate. Don’t think this ever worked and the spring plate would rotate in the bush.

Poly bush manufacturers supply the bushes with white grease to lube the plate / bush connection.

Other manufacturers can supply various types of bearings / bushes some have grease nipples others use self-lubricating material on hardened steel sleeves.

[Ian Comerford]

This morning I removed the end plates which help locate the spring plates.  Bother outer poly bushes were bone dry and I also tried to get some spray grease into the inner bushes.  It’s unlikely to have gone too far in because there is little access.  Regreasing the outers is really easy once the end plates are off and I figure that as they are the most exposed they could be more likely to creak. I’ve not driven it yet but will report back once done.

[Ian Comerford]

A quick drive today and the creaking appears to have gone, so it was probably just the outer bushes which as I mentioned before are a bit more exposed and were bone dry.  For a quick hour's work it was well worth trying.

Edited May 13, 2023 by Ian Comerford

[Ian Comerford]

After removing all or most of the creaking I am now thinking ahead and planning on changing the rear bushes.  It doesn’t seem worth going to the hassle of removing the spring to grease the current ones, might as well change them.  Lots of people say that when you remove the spring plated you must get it aligned again afterwards.  Part of me now questions this, especially after the rebuild I did 11 years ago.  I think I should be able to check the angle of the arm (still got the digital gauge I bought to do it last time), mark the relative positions of the two halves of the spring plates to one another and then just split them by undoing the two bolts holding them together (acknowledging that one is an adjuster).  Remove the spring plate, old bushes, grease up the relative bits (torsion bar, bushes etc) and reassemble.  Has anyone done this and have any helpful comments?

Thank you

Ian

[Leicestershire]

If you want a standard car I would recommend buying genuine spring porsche spring plates with the correct bushes vulcanised on the steel. Then you don't need to bother with grease and we will be out of fuel long before they need replacing.

Trying to align the spring plates upon re-fitting is almost impossible to get perfect. 

Ride height, toe and camber are just fractions of a mm between ok and 100% - fine if ok will do but not if you want perfect.

How accurate is your digital gauge and how thick is a mark scribed onto suspension components?

Treat your car to a full suspension alignment??

[Ian Comerford]

I think it should be ok to align them pretty accurately, such that I don’t notice it is different.  The digital gauge will ensure I pick up on the same spline on the torsion bars and I would aim to scribe a line where the plates overlap.  A scribed line is quite a bit less than 1mm thick, so should ensure sufficient accuracy.  I guess that I can do the donkey work and get CG to align if I felt it needs it, but I’m not convinced I’m a good enough driver to notice