danh52

I have poly control arm bushings on my C5 and some of the C clips are popping out of the groove during driving. I noticed this during my clutch replacement so removed both front upper arms as each one had a single clip that was out of position. I cleaned everything up and replaced the clips that were out. After only 200 miles of street driving and the initial new brake pad bedding procedure it looks like some clips are out of position again. This is only on the front upper a-arms. Is there a fix out there for this? I don't know the brand of the bushings but they do have grease grooves so might be Phadt's. The link bars look to be very nicely machined but the clips looked to be somewhat small. Any suggestions are welcome.

sperkins

If they're Pfadt:

https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums...-dogbones.html

danh52

I took some pics, it looks like it's the rear bushing on each side that has the retainer clip popped out of the groove.

Left side.


right side.

danh52

Thanks for the link. I'll order up some new ones and replace them all at the same time. The current version on the car looks like plain black ones, not spiral or plated ones.

sperkins

Those are definitely Pfadt. Swap the dogbones while you're in there. Most times, the groove in one gets worn which causes the snap ring to pop out.

danh52

Might be time to make new ones. They make a heavy duty version of snap rings that are thicker and use different groove dimensions. When I first reset the retainer clips the grooves looked good but I could tell that the clips were "tweaked" as they didn't lie flat. I think short term I'll replace the clips with new ones and make new dogbones that use a heavy duty clip as a more permanent fix.

danh52

Has anyone used a spiral locking ring instead of the standard one? The catalog shows them having a higher load rating and they fit the same groove dimensions. I think I will try them first since it appears that this is a common issue with the supplied lock rings.