read the thread man, they're not out yet

 

Sorry if I hurt your feelings. I'm not trying to insult anyone. I've been searching these boards for about a month and just recently joined. This seems like a great site with alot of good people involved. I'll try to be more sensitive to people's feelings in future posts.

Anyway, back to the topic at hand.
I think anyone interested in a better performing suspension would definately be pleased with a urethane bushing kit. I hope the Nismo kit will be urethane. In my opinion, ride quality is not compromised by the installation of urethane bushings, but I may not be as SENSITIVE as some .

 

I just got off the phone with NISMO on Saturday morning.

The bush is made from hard rubber ..

...and yes, they also said the handling, direct feeling, and cornering will be improved either for racing or the twisties.

 

Cant wait to hear your impressions.

 

Install is planned for the week of August 22 ... due to the Obon vacation period here in Japan.

I will try and take some pictures of the backroad 25 mile mountain course that I love to run (along with some other highly modified cars and motorcycles) in order to do a before-and-after impression.

 

Just for fun of it here is a Google translation of the Nismo web page:

"Is adopted with super durable race/lace the suspension bush
which Fair ready Z (Z33) business suspension bush sale


Front suspension Rear suspension



The NISSAN * motor sport * international corporation fair ready Z (the Z33) sets the business suspension bush, the NISMO shop of entire country, the NISSAN dealership and the NISSAN part dealership, we sell with the famous shop, and the NISMO product handling shop.

It is the commodity to which the suspension bush for the fair ready Z makes the rubber hardness of the genuine bush raise, raises rigidity. The front improvement of steering characteristic and the responsiveness which have the direct impression, the rear side rigidity at the time of the corner ring, you can obtain the improvement of the grip impression. It is setting every of region, but in order to pull out the largest effect, we recommend the use with set. Furthermore this commodity is adopted for also the participation vehicle to super durable race/lace.


* Suspension bush commodity summary
PARTS no. DESCRIPTION (item name) Consumption price including tax (substance price) REMARKS (summary)
54541-RRZ30 Front upper link bush \1,050 (\1,000)
54560-RRZ30 Front trance berth link bush \3,150 (\3,000)
55045-RRZ30 Rear upper arm bush \1,050 (\1,000)
55148-RRZ30 Rear radius rod bush axle side \1,365 (\1,300)
55149-RRZ30 Rear radius rod bush body side \1,365 (\1,300)
55152-RRZ30 Rear front lower link bush axle side \1,365 (\1,300)
55153-RRZ30 Rear front lower link bush body side \1,365 (\1,300)
55158-RRZ30 Rear rear lower link bush body side \1,365 (\1,300)
56218-RRZ30 Rear shock absorber - upper bush \630 (\600

 

What are the pros and cons of hardened rubber versus polyurethane? Does hardened rubber need to be lubed like the poly pieces? Will hardened rubber break down faster than poly?

 

The rubber bushings are designed to allow some degree of freedom of suspension movement in order to isolate road shock and noise from coming into the passenger compartment. A kind of a pillow so to speak. An example of this road noise is the tire noise which the Z is sensitive to.

This allowed suspension motion is not desirable for peformance at the track as it allows the wheel to move in ways that may not contribute to the efforts of the driver in controlling the car at the limit of tire adhesion. Hence, in racing cars the bushings are many times replaced with metal spherical bearings which do not allow any extra suspension motion other than in the pivot planes necessary for design suspension motion. Installing spherical bearings would really increase tire noise for street use.

An intemediate solution is to install harder materials in the bushings either harder rubber or polyurethane to limit motion but not completely- but increasing passenger compartment noise at the same time.

 

BTW my experience with Polyurethane in other than Z applications indicates it wants some lubricant installed from time to time to stop squeaking.

I would bet the Nismo bushings would not require lubrication in service and would last as long or longer than the stock bushings.

 

I hope you are right. I would not want to have to remove the various suspension parts periodically just to relube.

 

Usually, polyurethane bushings have grease passages built-in so you don't have to remove the suspension components in order to grease them.
Cupcar, you're absolutely right about the sqeaking from improperly lubed polyurethane. I forgot about that. It does get annoying. Maybe a harder rubber will be better than polyurethane. I have faith in Nismo.

 

I am looking at pictures I took of my suspension and it looks to me like the bushings are of the type where the rubber element is pressed into a tube and the tube with bushing is pressed into the suspension arm.

If this is the case, I once made made a simple puller that was essentially a cup with a washer that was mounted over a bolt. The cup was placed on one side of the bushing and the washer on the other then the bolt with a nut was used to do the operation of removing than replacing the bushing. The washer dragged the bushing into the cup. It looks like several of the bushings may be the same diameter so only maybe 1-2 pullers would be required.

 

Any updates

 

I'll second cupcar's method. The bolt/washer/cup method works great because of the hollow sleeve. If you have a set of large sockets (and I mean 3/4" drive, up to 2" hex), they make great cups. A press is nice, though.

Yes, it'll take a long time. If the 16 hours includes an alignment, it's reasonable. That first alignment is a pain because everything has moved.

My opinion is that, while this harder rubber bushing set will certainly help handling, it's still not worth the money and effort. A polyurethane set would cost as much and take as long to install, but give way better performance than any compliance bushing can.

Asterix

 

Has it started yet?

 

Yes .. dropped off the Z this past Sunday, August 21 since I am on a business trip this week. Plan to pick it up Friday or Saturday .. and will post my impressions later.

Interesting .. on the cover enclosing the plastic bag of each NISMO bushing is written ... "For Competition Use Only".

 

they put that on every NISMO product...

R-Tune / S-Tune / Bushing etc...

Even the NISMO Radiator Cap and Oil Cap!

 

Cool, looking forward to your impressions. So did you actually handle the new bushings in your hand? How stiff are they compared to polyurethane bushings?

 

if its anything like the NISMO Hard Rubber subframe inserts for the 240's...

 

Yes ... the Z bushings looked very similar to Jason's picture below ...