Anyone put 944 rear trailing arms on their bug?

fastbacker · Post by **fastbacker** » Fri Feb 27, 2009 9:37 am

I know it's been done numerous times and I'm getting ready to do it myself. I have early 944 turbo aluminum arms that I'm putting on my 69 bug. The problem I've encountered has to do with the pivot bushings on the small side of the arms. I was told you could fit beetle bushings into the arms and they'd bolt right up using the beetle through bolts but when I went to fit the bushings into the arms I found that the beetles bushings had a much smaller diameter that the bore in the 944 arm.

Anyone know the solution here?

Thanks-
Craig Backer

681tonburb · Post by **681tonburb** » Sat Feb 28, 2009 6:28 pm

I’m doing the same thing to my car haven’t gotten to that point yet but every thing I read said the t1 bushings was what you needed. To bad German look site is down it was a good place for the 944 conversion info.
I would like to use a set of these but there a little bit $$$

http://www.pelicanparts.com/cgi-bin/sma ... D%39%35%29

bt · Post by bt » Sat Feb 28, 2009 11:00 pm

I have them on my ghia. You have to push the 944 bushing out and replace it with a T1. The replacement T1 bushing is a 2-piece bushing.

I think I remember someone just pushing out the steel part in the 944 bush and forcing in a steel T1 part.

The T1 bushings are only about $25. for all 4.

This page has some good info

http://www.vdubengineering.com/technical.htm

fastbacker · Post by **fastbacker** » Sun Mar 01, 2009 11:35 pm

bt wrote:
The T1 bushings are only about $25. for all 4.

Wouldn't you only need 2?

The bushings were already removed when I bought my 86 aluminum arms. The bores on the arms are 42mm (diameter) and 42.3mm deep. The urethane irs bushings I bought from CB Performance are much smaller. This really confused me. The only thing I can think of is that the arms were bored out for some larger bushing - for some reason.

Does anyone know what the diameter of a irs bug's bushings are?

bt · Post by bt » Mon Mar 02, 2009 12:26 am

2 total bushing, 4 parts

My T1 bushing did not have to be pressed into the 944 arm. I have the red ones. They are not as tight as the old bushing but they are able to stay in by themselves.

Sorry I dont know the size of the T1

fastbacker · Post by **fastbacker** » Mon Mar 02, 2009 3:18 pm

bt wrote:2 total bushing, 4 parts

My T1 bushing did not have to be pressed into the 944 arm. I have the red ones. They are not as tight as the old bushing but they are able to stay in by themselves.

Sorry I dont know the size of the T1

Do you have steel or aluminum 944 arms?

bt · Post by bt » Mon Mar 02, 2009 4:14 pm

Aluminum

FYI -I still have the stock Ghia disk upfront. I have the 944 front parts but I am not ready to install them yet. I have read that 944 rears and stock Ghia fronts disk(and MC) does work. I added a proportion valvue just to be sure.

The reason I have not done the fronts is because I have new dropped spindles and you cant use the 944(NA) fronts on a dropped spindle.

fastbacker · Post by **fastbacker** » Mon Mar 02, 2009 4:49 pm

I had my cb dropped spindles and a set of 944 hubs modified by Lanner to accept 86 944t brakes. Couldn't you do the same for your n/a brakes?

What year are the arms you used?

bt · Post by bt » Mon Mar 02, 2009 7:19 pm

The NA brakes are in a different spot than the turbos. Thats why you can only use turbo front disk with dropped spindles. I was going Suby but I went in a different direction(1915). I dont need as much brake power.

I think mine are '86s. I did this stuff a few years ago.

PS. Lanner was very helpful
PPS my car is customed, so the wider arms are what I was looking for.

There are some pics of it on pg 3 of the "lets see your Ghia" thread in the KG section(sorry dont know how to bring the pics over here).

cudabnu · Post by **cudabnu** » Thu Mar 26, 2009 3:32 pm

I'm doing the conversion on my 71 Super Vert right now, I bought 86 Turbo rear arms, and Lanner is machining the 87-89 Turbo front hubs for me right now. I'll be taking pics as I go on the install, i'll try to post here, but all my other buildup pics are on airheadparts.com in the galley section.

fastbacker · Post by **fastbacker** » Thu Mar 26, 2009 4:26 pm

Seeing as I couldn't find any more info on the trailing arm bushings (germanlook's still down), I had my fab guy start to make a custom set of delrin bushings today.

bt · Post by bt » Thu Mar 26, 2009 4:41 pm

from pelican parts.

I'm sure with lots of 944 racing that someone has already made them up.

http://www.pelicanparts.com/cgi-bin/sma ... Each%20%20

cudabnu · Post by **cudabnu** » Thu Mar 26, 2009 4:54 pm

Stock Bug ones will work, just take out the stock 944 and replace with the stock bug one. I got mine from Empi 16-5122 urethane

bt · Post by bt » Thu Mar 26, 2009 5:02 pm

I posted that but....

The VW bolt is larger(diameter) than the Porsche bolt. If you are getting custom bushings, take that into account.

fastbacker · Post by **fastbacker** » Fri Mar 27, 2009 12:51 am

I ordered these irs urethane bug bushings http://www.cbperformance.com/catalog.asp?ProductID=1433 from CB Performance.
These are the ones I was originally referring to that don't come close to fitting in the 86 944 turbo arms. I don't get it.