{"id":1558,"date":"2026-02-08T17:47:58","date_gmt":"2026-02-09T01:47:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nickpisca.com\/diesel\/?p=1558"},"modified":"2026-02-08T17:47:58","modified_gmt":"2026-02-09T01:47:58","slug":"dana-44-econoline-radius-arm-custom-bushing-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nickpisca.com\/diesel\/suspension\/dana-44-econoline-radius-arm-custom-bushing-work\/","title":{"rendered":"Dana 44 Econoline Radius Arm Custom Bushing Work"},"content":{"rendered":"

Every part on this axle assembly needs some TLC, but the radius arms were a whole new project.\u00a0 When I broke down the axle and suspension, I started noticing some issue, but now that I’m doing the full restoration, it’s getting bad.<\/p>\n

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At first glance, everything looked old and rusty, but useable.<\/p>\n

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Flipped over and some wear and tear.\u00a0 The bushings need some replacements.\u00a0 I hope they are still available.<\/p>\n

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Uh oh, this bolt is busted off.\u00a0 That will need to be extracted, maybe with a welded nut or something.<\/p>\n

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The bushings appear to be from “Lord Kinematics, Erie PA. U.S.A. CB 1106-1”<\/p>\n

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A quick google search didn’t find much from Lord Kinematics anymore.\u00a0 Likely out of business since the 90’s.\u00a0 I did find some distributors that could find a replacement bushing, but they wanted $35 PER BUSHING.\u00a0 And they aren’t even a direct fit.\u00a0 That’s 1\/4 my budget for the whole axle restoration, just for radius arm bushings.<\/p>\n

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I’m cheap.\u00a0 But also, I have a lot of tools and resources.\u00a0 How hard could it be to get or make a rubber (or rubber-simulator) to be a shock absorber for the radius arm?\u00a0 I drew up a simple dimensional sketch to see what I could do.<\/p>\n

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First things first.\u00a0 Let’s get that busted bolt out before working on bushings.\u00a0 My buddy Shawn tried to weld a nut on that bolt about four times, and we never could get it<\/p>\n

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I didn’t want to waste his time with more welded nuts, so I took it back to my shop and use an Easy-Out to extract it.<\/p>\n

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Looked like I was getting good traction, but SNAP.<\/p>\n

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Well that sucked.\u00a0 The neighbor cat sat atop their shed watching me curse up a storm.<\/p>\n

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Now, I’m left with using the tap and die set to cut a bigger threaded hole.\u00a0 (I wire-wheeled, primed, and painted the radius arm before attempting the new threads)<\/p>\n

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New threads are metric.\u00a0 I don’t like that, but it’s the closest to the original size, so that I don’t get too close to edge. M10-1.5 x 40mm Hex Head Bolts, Carbon Steel Grade 8.8<\/p>\n

Why the hell didn’t I take a picture of the restoration of the radius arm?\u00a0 IDK.\u00a0 It was a lot of sanding, wire brushing, paint stripping, and de-rusting…. Plus some priming and painting.\u00a0 Anyway, just trust me, it’s much cleaner and more rust resistant now.<\/p>\n

So, I need some kind of bushing.\u00a0 Rubber, plastic, nylon, ….\u00a0 it’s up for debate.\u00a0 So I started some options:<\/p>\n

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In the center, this is the Lord Kinematics old bushing from 1979. I can’t find it anymore. On the right, is a custom DIY 3D printed bushing, designed by me and printed in high-strength nylon. Lastly on the left, this is a bushing that I found on Rock Auto that was very close to my needs, but maybe I can modify it to work.<\/p><\/div>\n

Of course I used my printer to make a custom 3D printed Nylon bushing.\u00a0 I even added helictical flutes on the interior, so that it could have a slight flex, similar to rubber.\u00a0 I didn’t do any FEA analysis to verify this, but I figured it if breaks, I’ll just update the parametric 3D model and reprint it.<\/p>\n

The other option is the MEVOTECH MS404116 (Daily Driver) Supreme – Front; 1.495 IN Outside Diameter.\u00a0 This is actually oval shaped in cross-section.\u00a0 Also, it has a steel casing.<\/p>\n

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Hmmm.\u00a0 Maybe it’ll pop out of the casing.\u00a0 Using my 20-ton press, it slid right out.<\/p>\n

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Now I’m cooking with gas.\u00a0 The only problem is it’s a little too long.\u00a0 Using a box cutter, I shaved off the nib in the back.<\/p>\n

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You can pop out the inner cylinder with a hammer.<\/p>\n

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The axle mounts are 2 1\/2″ inches apart, so I need the inner seal to be shorted to 1 3\/16″ on each side.\u00a0 Pretty short work with a grinder and metal cutting disk.<\/p>\n

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To make it easier to slide back into the rubber, I rounded the top with a flap disk.<\/p>\n

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Now just seven more to go.\u00a0 In-progress….<\/p>\n

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The rubber smooshes into the radius arm with not much effort.\u00a0 You need to use the press to get that steel cylinder in though.\u00a0 Needs some extra help.<\/p>\n

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It installed ok.\u00a0 Looks ok as well.\u00a0 I’m still not sure if this will work, but I’m giving it a shot<\/p>\n

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I’ll return to this post in the future.\u00a0 If these bushings are trash or this modification doesn’t work, then I’m back to trying the nylon 3D printed ones.\u00a0 Onward!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Every part on this axle assembly needs some TLC, but the radius arms were a whole new project.\u00a0 When I… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1574,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[238,177],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nickpisca.com\/diesel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1558"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nickpisca.com\/diesel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nickpisca.com\/diesel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nickpisca.com\/diesel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nickpisca.com\/diesel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1558"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.nickpisca.com\/diesel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1558\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1585,"href":"https:\/\/www.nickpisca.com\/diesel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1558\/revisions\/1585"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nickpisca.com\/diesel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1574"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nickpisca.com\/diesel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1558"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nickpisca.com\/diesel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1558"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nickpisca.com\/diesel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1558"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}