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Suspension Bushings

What is right for your car, Poly or Rubber?

Contributed By: Enginebasics.com

Suspension bushings are used in your car’s suspension, steering, and wheel components to isolate the different parts from each other and to prevent sound and vibrations coming from the road and tires to travel through the rest of the car. That vibration can cause problems to other parts of the car. They also prevent the joints from squeaking and wearing down. There are two main types of material that are used for suspension bushings: Rubber and polyurethane. Which one is better is actually dependent on what you intend to do with the car. There are Pro’s and Con’s to each.

Both can be manufactured with ranging hardness, or durometer. Both serve their purpose well. The only significant difference is that rubber won’t ever squeak where polyurethane will if not greased well, and rubber tends to deteriorate easier than polyurethane. Deterioration brings up important topic about the bushings. Since bushings can flex, they affect the steering of your car and the general feel of the car. If the bushings are soft, you car may feel loose and will turn differently. The reason it will turn differently comes from the fact that the bushing can flex. This allows the wheel to tilt because of the force of the turn. This can be fixed by using harder bushings. Harder bushing will increase the control you have because everything is now more rigid, but you will feel a lot more of the road and it will be noisier too. The softer the bushing, the quieter and smoother the ride will be. The harder the bushing, the better feel and less deflection in steering and suspension components you will have.

While still on the topic of deterioration, deterioration itself can be a problem. Deterioration will cause the rubber or polyurethane to soften and possibly break apart. So after a while, your car can come to feel loose and steering will be less controllable than originally. They deteriorate to the point that they no longer hold parts where they should be and the parts could start rubbing against each other creating noise and damage to the parts.

In the end, if you are just a general-purpose driver who mainly drives the vehicle on the street than stay with factory rubber bushings. If you don’t mind more vibration, and a louder ride, than the feedback and stiffness you gain in switching to a poly type bushing might be what your looking for.

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