The proper use of an adjustable strut rod will allow you to fine tune the Poly LCA bushing so it's snug against the K-frame.

I just cut 3/16" off the rear poly strut bushing to bring mine tight. Ran it that way from 1997 to 2011. Nothing wrong with them. Just got a prototype/promo Hotchkis setup.

The LCA poly bushings are the same ones from 1997. The guy at Hotchkis said they were still good and fit well. So he left them in.

I doubt by much as the factory boys weren't stupid and the failure rate of the bushings would have made it apparent. However that is providing the LCA and Strut remain in a fixed position to each other as designed. When one starts playing with the length of the strut that goes in the sh-tter Bubba's ideas are not always good for the distance and many times lead to other problems. One would have to geometrically lay it out to see exactly how much movement was at the pivot point in the factory design.
I strongly suspect the adjustable struts came into use as other mfr's did use the strut for adjustment BUT with a different LCA design and Bubba couldn't get his caster where he wanted so let's do what them people at Ford and GM did on SOME of their cars. Hey Leroy, go get a couple of cases of beer while I start hacking this idea out. Next thing one sees is they're being marketed as a solution. Remember Slick 50? MPG improvers, engine rebuild pellets for your oil burner? LOL Those and thousands of other products were all designed to get money form your pocket to theirs and some were quite successful LOL

As far as the urethane goes, had them in my 68 Charger for 30 years without an issue. Other cars as well

The T-bar moves forward and back too, it doesn’t fit tight in the LCA

Agreed... BTDT

RUBBER AND POLY PIECES CAN BE MIXED UP ANYWHERE BUT between those two mentioned as explained.

It will compress too much. The poly bushings on LCA doesn't have the same friction than rubber, so LCA will be able to move in and out. The strut rod is not strong enough to absorb this move and will compres up to crack. BTDT

You’re right, the T-bar is not a tight fit.

But it doesn’t move. Mark and measure them at the rear. No movement for and aft. There’s ~1/4” of distance between T-bar rear end and the wire C-clip if you install the T-bar pushed forward.

There’s a massive amount of pound per square inch on the hex edge contact points.

I’ve been off course on the track and couple times and never a movement. Once I bent a rallye rim center section and bottomed a shock. Another time almost rolled it and went into infield desert 200ft or so sideways.

All with poly LCA bushings.

Yes a lot of pressure on the bar, but it could move. What I said was the LCA moves on the bar, as you said 1/4” lateral play. With that being said the strut acts as a pivot between tire and bushing with friction of tire pushing back and bushing moving forward, hard reverse will move it back. IF a loose movable type bushing is used

I


Ya that is not quite the story on adjustable strut rods. They are designed to make up for the [censored], shoddy construction of the cars and especially the k-frames. What you do is put the car on a frame machine or alignment rack and square the frame, get the rear end in the car square, then get the left and right wheelbase the same. You would be amazed at how well these cars align after you do that. Ever measure a dozen mopar strut rods? They vary a lot. Anyway you can do this at home on a garage floor with plumb bobs, rear spring bracket shims, various strut rods and a little time. I set it axle center to lower ball joint center at ride height with just the lower arm in. Lower bushing style is not a big deal to me, but the urethane strut bushings will need that 3/16" removed from the back side to get the wheelbase right. If I remember right the moog improved strut bushings were also too thick. Adjustable struts are fantastic, your alignment guy can get it right real fast without bushing mods, restorations are a different animal, will need various strut rods or the ability to machine or shim them, but you can get it perfect. If you want a bunch of caster, and I would give it more
with radials, use the problem solver upper bushings or adjustable upper arms.

l'll not disagree on the first part of your commentary as I have NO experience with what you say but will 100% agree with the bolded part
To me the adjustable struts are comparable to cutting coil springs to lower a car. IT does lower the car BUT screws up suspension geometry, travel and ride quality in the process. So Bubba accomplishes his goal while being UHH? (be nice) on the effects.
If you have a sense of humor and the time, some other examples of his work can be found here BUBBA'S SHOP IDEAS AND FIXES
LOL And yes, I have a lot more examples LOL

I think you would change your mind on adjustable struts if you ever tried to get a car squared up, keep in mind 1/4" at the strut socket is more at the wheel, then if the other side is off the opposite way you end up 3/4-1" off on your wheel base. 1/2" is about 2 degrees so we are out of adjustment to start. Worst I have seen a mopar is 1-1/8" off side to side. Now add in strut bushings that are wrong and we wonder why these cars can drive so bad, and alignment guys hate working on them. Adjustable struts are a fantastic for mopars, just not to add caster we can all agree on that. Good alignment guys love it when the car has both I can tell you that. I figured this out 36 years ago when I redid the front end on the wife's Cuda with moog parts, drove worse than when it was stock, threw it on a frame machine and said OIC junk parts. I fix the wheelbase on every mopar I touch now that I know.

On the fixed radius of strut and LCA on an A-body k-frame I found the true pivot point to be on the forward side of the strut ‘hole’ (where the rubber biscuits go) so I made my heim joint bracket on that side, now both (strut and arm) swing in the same arc, not moving back and forth. I’ve also made the lower arm with a greasable bronze bushing with a bolt in the back to keep it ON the pin, But I’ve been called stupid and wrong so I’ll leave it at that.

Cudaman69, I sure would be interested in seeing a picture of your strut setup, if possible. Thank you !

I'm not a fan of the poly lower control arm bushings. I have installed them in the past, and would not use them again. I know plenty of people do, but i also do not like switching to the green axle bearings in an 8 3/4 either. The lower control arm bushings are not only a pivot, but they also fix the lower control arm in for and aft movement. I think Chrysler engineers got this right, and I would not change that on my own car.
My personal bushing recipe on my Mopars:

OEM style upper and lower control arm bushings.
Poly strut rod bushings
Poly sway bar and link bushings.

Do not tighten the upper control arm adjusters or lower control pivot nut until the car is set at correct ride height, and aligned, so the bushings are relaxed at rest. This helps them last.

Hope pics come out ok. Had vid of me working it up and down with one finger but can’t seem to find it

Found it but wouldn’t load. Started out with the QA1 piece but it would bind on full travel, this for a race car with tires off ground (hopefully)
street car wouldn’t need this setup (I would hope your street car don’t have tires in the air)

Thanks Cudaman, that's quite the interesting idea !

This guy gets it. Another trick is cutting down the steel strut rod bushing. They are usually too long and get crushed on one end when the steel bushing binds up.

On the subject of poly bushings I see two aspects not discussed.

First is that oil and poly bushings do not mix. If you have a long standing engine oil leak it will kill the LCA bushings. Most of the cars I have seen with short poly bushing life were leakers. Do not use petroleum products on poly bushings. Summit and others sell a high viscosity silicone grease that is packed in a tube for your grease gun.

I have had issues with aftermarket greasable LCA pins (QA1, Proforged, etc.) not registering correctly in the stock k frame. The profile of the aftermarket pins is different than the stock pieces. I end up cutting the profile back to 1.150" from the threaded end and tilt the cutter to give a .100 chamfer for a total of 1.250". I informed QA1 of this issue in 2013.

That said, I think the poly bushings finally became viable on a street/low maintenance car when the greasable LCA pivots and UCA's with grease fittings on the bushing housing bore. Prior to that you had to r&r the LCA bushing if they started to squeak. Not the end of the world if you have the means, yet very annoying as a maintenance item.

This was contrary to what I knew of polyurethane bushings A bit of research shows that depending on the materials used when making the the raw material some are in fact susceptible to petroleum products while others are resistant. I would expect that a REPUTABLE supplier would be sourcing the latter. There is more info in the following link and comments
LINKY

I'm wondering how many ppl actually use their cars as a drivers to really test all the parts. Anybody can say "I have a poly assembly since 20 years now and I haven't had any problem"... but, how many miles?

In my experience, is just about match correctly the parts to guarantee the effectiveness on the assembly.

This is it exactly, they putt-putt around to car shows. I hate urethane and poly end link bushings, always deformed and wiped out, and will be switching the front and rear bar to the Ford expedition style ball joint end links. I figure it will break the rear spring sway bar plates but I will gusset them. Stock lower bushings and moog problem solver uppers have served me well. End link bushings not so much.