eddie_1
Veteran Member
- Joined
- Dec 27, 2004
- TDI
- Jetta Wagon 2003 TDI tuned to 170HP, A6 Wagon 2008 TDI 2.7L tuned to 340HP
Did this job with Jack stands and floor jack holding up the beam.
On each side:
- Unhook 2 clips and 1 bracket holding the hand brake cable. Bracket needs to be pried down.
- Unhook brake sensor cable in 2 locations
- Remove 2 flat retainer clips holding brake lines at steel line to hose interfaces. Just needs to be pulled out flat (flush to surface).
Then:
- Remove the 2 bolts holding bushings and lower axle just enough to gain access to bushings. (On the passenger side I could not remove the bolt initially as the fuel tank was in the way. I needed to release 4 bolts holding the bushing bracket to the body)
- The fun part: In my case 2003 I was lucky enough to have the non-metal housing bushings. I used a couple of different chisels and punches. On the passenger side I drove the chisels pictured below on the outer edge; took maybe only 10 minutes, but on the driver side the bushing came out with just one sequence of hits with one chisel, shown to the right of the hammer in image below encircled in red.
- For installation I used the cheap press available on the internet for the mk4. The Bushing did not completely bottom out, because it was a bit assymetrical, but I left it like that for fear of breaking the plastic lip by further compression.
- Using a good amount of grease to get started helps.
- On installation used floor jack to reposition things.
- Torque specs: Bushing bracket to body 75NM. Bushing bolt 80NM (under load).
All in all not a too bad job if you have the plastic housing bushings.
On each side:
- Unhook 2 clips and 1 bracket holding the hand brake cable. Bracket needs to be pried down.
- Unhook brake sensor cable in 2 locations
- Remove 2 flat retainer clips holding brake lines at steel line to hose interfaces. Just needs to be pulled out flat (flush to surface).
Then:
- Remove the 2 bolts holding bushings and lower axle just enough to gain access to bushings. (On the passenger side I could not remove the bolt initially as the fuel tank was in the way. I needed to release 4 bolts holding the bushing bracket to the body)
- The fun part: In my case 2003 I was lucky enough to have the non-metal housing bushings. I used a couple of different chisels and punches. On the passenger side I drove the chisels pictured below on the outer edge; took maybe only 10 minutes, but on the driver side the bushing came out with just one sequence of hits with one chisel, shown to the right of the hammer in image below encircled in red.
- For installation I used the cheap press available on the internet for the mk4. The Bushing did not completely bottom out, because it was a bit assymetrical, but I left it like that for fear of breaking the plastic lip by further compression.
- Using a good amount of grease to get started helps.
- On installation used floor jack to reposition things.
- Torque specs: Bushing bracket to body 75NM. Bushing bolt 80NM (under load).
All in all not a too bad job if you have the plastic housing bushings.
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