Hi Roger

Good point about stress in the bushings - dont think I've seen this
in Haynes or Bentley.

Yes, it is rusty som places - but believe it or not, not that much
worse than a lot of other cars from same period in Denmark, land of
salt-trucks a lot...

Happy driving

JJ

At 17:45 14-04-2006, Roger Sisler wrote:
>One other point of this repair.The trailing arm bushings need to be
>pretensioned when installed.When the repair is done, and you lower the van
>to the ground,the weight of the vehicle will cause the new bushing to be
>twisted. This,by the amount the weight flexes the arm. Your new bushings
>will always be stressed until the suspension travels the entire amount it
>can move.Then the bushing is relaxed. You want the opposite. The bushing is
>stressed when you hit a pot hole and relaxes when the suspension is back to
>normal.To do this , complete your repair and lower the vehicle. All vehicle
>weight needs to be on the wheels. Now,crawl under the van one last time and
>loosen the bolts that attach the trailing arm to the frame.Dont mess up
>your alignmen,but loosen the bolts up good. Bounce on the bumper a couple
>times to release the bushing from its stressed, grip. It is now relaxed.
>Retighten the trailing arm bolts,any you are done.The same pretensioning
>goes for the front lower control arms weather they be sheet metal or cast
>iorn.However, for your vanagon(that thing I see between all that rust)this
>is a different story. When you hit your first pot hole , you will be
>writing,asking about how to replace an entire wheel.Use that  blue Rustagon
>for parts.