So I just bought a 1990 volvo with auto. It shudders quite a bit on acceleration. I plan on replacing the u joints and center carrier rubber.

Also if I was to replace all of the rubber in there rear I would need:
Trailing arm bushings front and rear
Sway bar bushings
Track rod aka panhard bushings
Think I need the rear spring seats? 200k on car
Anything I'm missing? Should I go poly?

The front suspension parts have already all been purchased by the previous owner.

 

If you're gonna change out your bushings, you might as well go for poly. I doubt you'll be doing this again anytime soon. I think you forgot to mention the torque rod bushings, two parallel bars that brace the rear axle. Besides that I would put lower chassis braces, the thicker sway bars, and an ipd skid plate while you're under there, touch up any places where any paint or that anti-winter black undercoating is missing, and hell...you might as well put that ipd exhaust kit too (I did on mine ). Subscribe and wait for ipd's sales, they happen all the time 10% to 30% off.

I did a poly bushing change out on my car at about 110k, because I was having that loud pop when starting from a standstill that I thought was the trailing arm bushing. The swap went pretty good, but the pop is still there sometimes, so go figure... I will say you have to be very careful to not bend the "ears" where the fronts of the trailing arms are bolted. And you'll probably have to get creative to get these large bushing retainers out. Read: sawzall, angle grinder, lots of WD40.

Anyway, it's quite a bit of work to change them out, I had to ask a tranny shop's permission to use their 20 ton press to pop out the old bushings and smash (I mean...press) the new ones in. It was nice that they had all manner of scrap circular doodads to support the part and press the bushing at the same time.

My motto is that if you're already elbows deep into something, you might as well do everything right while you're there. No sense in spending the set-up time at a later date. Don't forget anti-seize and make those bolts tight, not snug, not eh..., but tight!

 

Actually, unless you're building a track car, I would recommend not using poly, instead go with OEM volvo rubber bushings. Poly bushings are harsh riding, and have a tendency to squeak after a couple years.

acceleration shudder, if its not your drive shaft center bearing or bushing or carrier, then I'd suspect engine and transmission mounts long before I'd suspect rear end bushings.

 

That's a good point. I couldn't find OEM Volvo bushings, just the garbage URO kind... I'd tried buying URO stuff before and the fitment was a joke.

 

btw... we put over 500,000 miles on our 1987 240 (bought new), and never needed u-joints.

we did the rear bushings on the 240 when it started to make clunks you could feel through your seat on bumps and turns, that was somewhere around 350,000 miles, maybe more. with lots of hard driving on bad roads.

I did all the bushings front and rear on my 1992 740 turbo wagon when I bought it with 200K miles, I'm not actually sure it was really necessary, I had money to burn since i was buying a 20 year old car instead of a new one. also did overload springs, bilsteins, IPD sway bars. all this made the 740 ride harsh when empty but amazingly solid and competent when heavily loaded. my son's GF has it, its her daily commuter in reno, and she's really happy, the most solid car she's ever owned.

 

try fcpeuro or ipdusa, otherwise, look up the volvo part numbers at a dealer site like https://www.volvopartswebstore.com ....

I have an old copy of VADIS, the digital parts catalog, I run it on a windows XP VM who's clock is set back to 2007, and has zero network connectivity, hahahah), this has all the part numbers for volvos from 1975 240 to 2005 XC90... not all the 240/740/940 parts are still available, but knowing the correct PN gets you on the right path.

this is part of the reason I've gotten rid of my volvos and now have a fleet of early 90's Mercedes E class... MB has nearly all parts for everything for fair prices, and they are all still top quality. The other reason is, dayum, they are NICE cars to drive, hahahaahah.

 

Well it came with all made in sweden or german front parts. Every bit of rubber/tie rods/ball joints/and shocks for the front. The rear didn't come with the car and I'm buying poly.