Have you experienced steering wheel vibration, braking vibration, experienced pull when braking or accelerating, experienced sudden brake and steer when passing over a puddle hole, have you noticed uneven wear on your tires. If you have noticed one or the other of these troubleshooting symptoms your lower front Table bushings or back table bushings or tie rodes, or ball joint might have just passed away.
Trouble shooting worn table bushing is quite simple, jack up the car and try juggling the wheel back and forth, front and back, left to right, there should't be any play, if there is any play, you might have a worn out suspension component. They will require further visual inspection to see if a ball joint is torn or has too much play or to see if your bushings are torn.
Changing bushings is quit simple as you will see in this simple step by step tutorial. I have added steps explaining how to change ball joints because mine was worn out but yours might not be.
1. First thing first, jack up the car.
2. Secure the car with jack stands
3. Remove tire and make visual inspection of ball joint and front and back table bushings
4. Remove controle bar linkage by removing bolt, before removing, use jack to release control arm tension, place jack underneath ball joint, just behind brake disk.
5. Remove front suspension table bolt
6. Unscrew and remove back suspension table bolt
7. If you want to swap ball joint with new ones, don't bother, remove lower ball joint bolts, **If you want to fit them back in, here is an awesome trick, paint the suspension table and ball joint lower bolts so you could put bolts back at there exact location when you reassemble therefore minimizing risks of needing to aligning car in Garage.
8. Remove upper ball joint bolt necessary tools such as a ball joint fork to release ball joint, might make the job much easier. (not necessary if not changing ball joints)
9. To remove suspension table with ease, rotate table towards back of the car and pull, it should come out easily with this simple trick
10. Remove the old bushings from the cavities
11. Remove inside metal bushing housing, I used a metal saw, a flat screw driver and a hammer. clean surface afterwards with soft sand paper.
12. Remove second bushing, I used heat, never the less, this one isn't easy, a hydraulic press would certainly make the job much easier.
13. Install the new bushings, I used two vice and a cheaters bar, make sure to keep the bushing straight all the way in.
14. Install front bushing, it is quit a tight fit, but it will eventually fit if you apply the right pressure.
15. Bolt in new ball joints (if you changed them)
18. Lift suspension table using jack to align and screw control arm linkage bolt
19. It is strongly suggested to align car wheels to minimize un even tire wear and other problems that could occur due to misalignment.
20. Hope all went well, and that you enjoyed this tutorial on how to repair bushings on jetta!
(This tutorial applies to all volkswagen mk4 models including Golf, Jetta, Beetle, for 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2004 2005, Vr6 Tdi and 1.8T )
