What kind of suspension bushings does the FD use?
 

I know the rear has pillowball(s), which is fairly unusual for a production car, but I don't think the other bushings are normal rubber bushings, either.

Does any one know what they're called? Typical rubber bushings basically work by twisting, which is why you have to tighten them with the suspension loaded. I think the same is true about urethane bushings.

But the metal part on the FD's stock bushings can turn freely, which I take to mean that you don't have to load the suspension before you tighten it (which is also true of a pillowball suspension).

Anyone know what they're called? Technically speaking.

Only some of the rear bushings (3 per side) are pillowballs. Mazda did this because those joints need to be able to pivot, if not they would bind and the suspension wouldn't work.

The other bushings are traditional rubber with a metal sleeve.

Dale

AFAIK, they're not regular rubber bushings. From what I've heard, they're somewhere between bushings and spherical bearings...

Many of the bushings are a Hybrid style. Spherical with a layer of rubber on the outside to reduce NVH.

http://foxed.ca/rx7manual/manuals/93...highlights.pdf

section R. the front upper bushings were changed at some point, the sliding made a clunk, so they removed that feature.

Crazy. Five different types of bushings... not even counting the ball joints, although they might fall into the pillow bush category.

When did they stop using slide bushings (.....just a direct translation of the Japanese term...) on the front upper arm? And what did they change them to?

I don't want to have to go back and retighten them with the suspension loaded if I don't have to.

looks like anything after 12/95 production has the updated bushing. there was a bulletin for the clunking, and they offered the new bushing as a fix, but not a lot of people complained so we didn't do a lot of them.

My 2/92 still had the original upper A-arm bushings, they didn't start clunking until last year.

Mine is a 96, but I didn't even know about the sliding bushings when I was working on the suspension, so I didn't think to check them. Sure they were replaced with normal (torsion-based) rubber bushings, and simply improved sliding bearings?

My lower arms actually have aftermarket pillow ball bushings. I suppose if you're going to increased response, you'd really only need to do the lowers on the front (at least, in terms of bang for your buck).

As for the rear, I've got pillow-ball toe links that I had to pay an insane amount to replace the rod ends (for what appear to be cheap, two-piece metal-on-metal rod ends). The traction arm has "pillow bush" hybrids on the body side, if memory serves, and connects to a pillow ball in the arm, so other than wheel clearance or adjustment, I can't imagine there are many gains to changing it.