How to Replace Upper Control Arm Bushings on a Chevelle or Other GM A-Body

Plenty of Chevelle owners have a story about a front end that clunked over railroad tracks or wandered all over the lane on the highway, and more often than not the culprit was a pair of tired rubber bushings in the upper control arms. This guide walks through how to replace upper control arm bushings on a GM A-body, the 1964-1972 Chevelle, Malibu, and El Camino, the GTO, LeMans, and Tempest, the Cutlass and 442, and the Skylark and GS, with notes for the 1973-1977 Colonnade cars where they differ. It is not a hard job, but it rewards patience, a few marked bags for shims, and one rule that a lot of people skip: the bushing bolts get their final torque with the car sitting on its wheels.

I will cover how to tell the bushings are worn, what parts to buy and why, the tools that make the pressing part painless, how to keep a loaded coil spring from becoming a bad day, and the order of operations that gets the car back to the alignment shop without surprises. Where I give a torque number, I tell you where it came from. Where the factory books disagree, I say so and send you to the manual for your car.

What the Upper Control Arm Bushings Actually Do

On a 1964-1972 A-body, the upper control arm pivots on a cross shaft, sometimes called the upper control arm shaft. That shaft bolts to the frame with two studs and nuts, and the alignment shims sit between the shaft and the frame. Two bushings are pressed into the eyes of the arm, one at the front and one at the rear, and the cross shaft runs through both of them.

A factory style rubber bushing is a steel outer shell, a layer of rubber, and a steel inner sleeve. The outer shell is pressed into the arm. The inner sleeve gets clamped to the end of the cross shaft by a large washer and either a small bolt threaded into the end of the shaft or a nut on a threaded shaft end. Once it is clamped, the inner sleeve does not spin. When the wheel moves up and down, the rubber twists. As Lever Family Racing puts it in their retyped notes from the GM manuals, these bushings are not a bearing for the arm to pivot on. The rubber resists the movement of the arm.

That detail matters for everything that follows. A twist type rubber bushing has a neutral position, and that neutral position is wherever the arm was sitting when you tightened the bolts.

Bolt style and nut style retainers

You will find two common ways the bushings are held on the shaft. Lever Family Racing, who has handled a lot of these arms, describes the bolt style retainer as the general rule on 1964-1968 cars, with small bolts threaded into the ends of the shaft to hold the big retaining washer. The nut style retainer, generally 1969-1972, has threaded shaft ends with a large nut. They also note that the two styles show up mixed across model years, that the arms themselves are the same, that both styles use the same bushings, and that they interchange. Owners on the GTO forum report the same mix, so do not be surprised if your 1971 has bolts and your buddy’s 1966 has nuts. Lever also mentions a third, less common style where the bushing threads onto the shaft. Look at what is on your car before you order hardware.

Colonnade cars, 1973-1977

The 1973-1977 Colonnade A-bodies use different upper arms and different bushings than the 1964-1972 cars, so the parts are not interchangeable. The basic idea is the same: a cross shaft, shims at the frame, two pressed bushings. One detail to watch: Moog’s catalog lists its K6144 upper bushing kit for many 1974-1977 Colonnade A-bodies, including the El Camino, Monte Carlo, Cutlass, LeMans, Grand Prix, and Century, and that kit contains two different bushings, one about 2.00 inches in outside diameter and one about 1.87 inches. Front and rear are not the same part, so mark which eye each old bushing came out of. Moog’s K6144 listing does not cover 1973, so look up your exact year and model before you order.

Symptoms of Worn Upper Control Arm Bushings

Upper bushings usually fail slowly, so the symptoms creep up on you. Here is what I look and listen for.

• A clunk or knock from the front end over bumps, potholes, or driveway aprons
• Wandering or darting on the highway, where you are always making small corrections
• A pull to one side under braking that comes and goes
• An alignment that will not hold, or camber that changes after a few hundred miles
• Uneven wear on the inside or outside shoulder of the front tires
• Rubber that is cracked, crumbling, or pushed out of one side of the shell
• An arm that sits visibly off center on its cross shaft, so one end of the arm is closer to the retaining washer than the other
• On polyurethane bushings, a squeak or groan that gets worse in cold or dry weather

To check them, raise the front of the car and support it on jack stands under the frame. Put a floor jack under the lower control arm near the ball joint and raise it until the suspension is loaded a little. With a pry bar, gently lever between the upper arm and the frame and watch the bushing ends. A good rubber bushing flexes a little and springs back. A worn one lets the arm shift on the shaft, or you will see the inner sleeve move separately from the rubber. While you are there, check the upper ball joint, the lower control arm bushings, and the rubber bump stops. Global West notes in its control arm instructions that a lot of older cars have lost the upper bump stop on the frame entirely, so look for it.

Parts Choices: Rubber, Polyurethane, Delrin, and Offset Shafts

This is where most people spend more time than they spend on the actual job. Here is how I think about it.

Factory style rubber

Steel clad rubber bushings are what the car came with. They are quiet, they isolate road noise, and they are cheap. The common Moog part for 1964-1972 A-bodies is K5196, which Moog sells as two bushings per box, enough for one arm, with no bolts or washers included. Moog’s catalog lists K5196 for the 1964-1972 Chevelle and El Camino, the 1964-1972 GTO and LeMans, the 1965-1972 Cutlass, the 1965-1971 442, and the 1966-1972 Skylark, among many other GM cars. Run your exact year and model through the catalog anyway, especially on early Buick and Oldsmobile cars. Rubber bushings are one piece and are pressed into the arm. They are also the only type here that cares about ride height when you tighten them, which I will explain later.

Polyurethane

Polyurethane bushings, such as Energy Suspension’s kits, are usually a two piece design: a poly half goes into each side of the shell and a steel sleeve runs through the middle. They are not bonded like rubber. The arm pivots on the greased sleeve instead of twisting the rubber, so steering feels more precise, but they pass more road feel and they will squeak if they are not greased.

Pay attention to the instructions. Energy Suspension’s general purpose control arm bushing instructions tell you to reuse the original outer metal shells when the kit does not include new ones. That means you do not press the shells out. You burn the old rubber out of them. Their method is light, even heat around the outside of the arm until you see light smoke from the rubber, which breaks the bond, and then you push the rubber and inner sleeve out. They are clear that there should never be flames, and they warn that some old rubber and sleeves are preloaded and can eject quickly. Clean every bit of old rubber out of the shell, and grease the inside of the shell, the bushing, and the sleeve with the supplied grease before assembly.

Delrin and Del-a-lum

Global West’s Del-a-lum upper bushing kit, part 1012 for 1964-1972 A-bodies, uses a steel outer housing with a Delrin plastic insert, plastic and steel thrust washers, and a grease fitting in each bushing. It acts more like a bearing than a bushing. Global West is blunt about the install: it requires a press, and you cannot hammer the bushings into the arm or you will damage the arm, the bushing, or both. You orient each housing so the grease fitting can be reached with the arm on the car.

There is a catch on stock shafts. Eckler’s listing for this kit notes that most stock 1964-1972 upper shafts use a 3/8 inch bolt in the end of the shaft, and to run Del-a-lum bushings that bolt has to be replaced with a 5/8 inch stud that is welded on. The kit sold with stud extensions includes them. The slotted nut is then adjusted like a wheel bearing and held with a cotter pin, not torqued to a number.

Offset cross shafts

If the alignment shop has told you they cannot get enough positive camber, an offset cross shaft may be the answer. Moog’s K5250 Problem Solver shaft kit is the common one for 1964-1972 Chevelles. Southern Rods, in their instructions for 1964-1972 Chevelle tubular arms, describe it as having a 3/16 inch offset built in that lets you change the length of the upper arm by a total of 3/8 inch, and they explain that these front subframes tend to sag in normal use. They say to start with the shaft facing the wheel side, as printed on the shaft. If you are replacing bushings anyway, this is the time to add offset shafts, because the shaft has to go in before the second bushing does.

New hardware and the parts to replace while you are in there

Buy new collar bolts or nuts and new retaining washers if yours are rusty or stretched. Energy Suspension recommends grade 8 or better hardware for cross shaft fasteners and red thread locker, noting that stripped nuts and old lock washers are a major cause of them coming loose. If the upper ball joint is original or loose, replace it now while the arm is on the bench. The factory joints were riveted to the arm and service joints bolt in. Southern Rods lists Moog K5108 as the stock upper ball joint for 1964-1972 Chevelles. Some people skip the whole job and buy complete arms, such as Global West’s CTA-42A tubular uppers, which come assembled with bushings, cross shafts, ball joints, and bump stops.

Tools You Will Need

• Floor jack, plus a second jack or a tall jack stand for the lower arm
• Four good jack stands rated for the car, and wheel chocks
• Breaker bar, ratchets, and 6 point sockets in SAE sizes
• Penetrating oil and a wire brush
• A ball joint separator, a tie rod and ball joint puller, or a pickle fork if you are replacing the ball joint and do not care about the boot
• A way to press bushings: a hydraulic shop press, a C-frame ball joint press with bushing adapters, or a threaded bushing tool with a receiving cup and driver that fit the bushing shell
• A spacer that fits between the arm flanges so the arm does not get crushed while you press
• A torque wrench that covers roughly 20 to 100 ft-lb
• Masking tape, a paint pen, zip top bags, and your phone for photos
• Mechanic’s wire or a bungee to hang the spindle
• Grease gun and the grease your bushing kit calls for
• Safety glasses and gloves, and a fire extinguisher if you plan to heat out old rubber

A word about coil springs

On these cars the front coil spring sits between the lower control arm and the frame, and it is under a lot of load even with the car in the air. You do not need to remove the spring to replace upper bushings. The floor jack under the lower arm is what keeps the spring captured while the upper ball joint is disconnected. If that jack slips, the lower arm drops and the spring can come out with serious force. So put a second jack or a stand under the lower arm as backup, as Global West recommends in its instructions, and many mechanics also run a safety chain through the spring coils and around the lower arm. If your plan changes and the lower arm has to come down, stop and use a proper coil spring compressor designed for this style of front suspension, follow its instructions exactly, and never heat or cut a loaded spring.

Safety First: Supporting the Car

• Work on a flat, solid floor, chock the rear wheels, and put the transmission in park or in gear with the parking brake set
• Loosen the front lug nuts while the car is on the ground
• Lift the car and set the jack stands under the frame rails, not under the lower control arms, so the suspension can hang and be controlled with the floor jack
• Shake the car before you crawl under it. If it moves, reset the stands
• Keep a jack under the lower control arm, near the ball joint, the entire time the upper ball joint is disconnected
• Do not let the brake caliper or spindle hang on the brake hose
• Wear eye protection when pressing. A bushing shell that lets go in a press moves fast

How to Replace Upper Control Arm Bushings on a GM A-Body, Step by Step

I do one side at a time. That way the other side is always there as a reference for how the shims, washers, and shaft look.

Removing the upper control arm

1. Raise the front of the car and support the frame on jack stands, then remove the wheel.
2. Place a floor jack under the lower control arm, out near the ball joint, and raise it until the upper control arm comes off its rubber bump stop on the frame. Place a second jack or stand under the lower arm for safety.
3. Before you touch the cross shaft nuts, look at the shims. There is a stack at the front stud and a stack at the rear stud, and they are rarely the same. Count them, note their thickness if you can, photograph them, and bag and tag each stack: left front stud, left rear stud, and so on. This is the single most useful thing you can do for the alignment shop.
4. Take a paint pen and mark the cross shaft and the frame so you can see later how the shaft sat. Note which side of the shaft faces the frame.
5. Remove the cotter pin from the upper ball joint stud and loosen the castle nut a few turns, but leave it on the threads. Break the taper loose with your separator or puller. The nut stays on so the spindle cannot jump when the taper lets go.
6. With the lower arm still supported, remove the ball joint nut and lift the upper arm off the spindle. Hang the spindle with wire so the brake hose is not stretched.
7. Remove the two nuts that hold the cross shaft to the frame and slide the arm and shaft off the studs, keeping the shims with their tags. If headers or exhaust block the arm from sliding off, Global West says to press the studs out of the frame. Do not put a socket on them and spin them out. They are knurled, and turning them damages them. Tap them back in with a drift when the arm goes back on.

Pressing out the old bushings

On the bench, mark the arm left or right and front or rear before anything else. The left and right arms are different, and the front and rear bushing positions should go back the way they came out. Spray the collar bolts or nuts with penetrating oil and remove them along with the retaining washers. Lever Family Racing notes that the nut style shafts tend to have more trouble with rust in the threads, so clean the threads with a wire brush and be gentle. If the threads are torn up, replace the shaft.

Now support the arm so it cannot collapse. The two eyes of the arm need to stay parallel and in line, or the new bushings will bind on the shaft. Energy Suspension’s instructions show a piece of channel, angle iron, or thick wall tubing cut to fit between the flanges, and they warn that crushing the arm stretches the metal and ovals the eyes. Set the arm in the press or put the C-frame tool on with a receiving cup on one side that is larger than the bushing shell and a driver on the other side that pushes on the shell, not the rubber.

Press the first bushing out, work the cross shaft free of the arm, and press the second one out. Rubber bushings that have been in the car for decades often fight you. Steady pressure works. If you are using a poly kit that reuses the original shells, follow the heat method from the parts section instead and leave the shells in the arm.

Clean the eyes of the arm and look them over. You want round eyes with no cracks at the welds and no flared edges. If an eye is ovaled or cracked, get another arm. A new bushing will not stay tight in a damaged eye.

Pressing in the new bushings

1. Check which end of the bushing faces out. Most factory style rubber bushing shells have a flange that seats against the outside of the arm eye.
2. Press the first bushing in squarely, pushing only on the outer shell, until it seats against the arm. Global West’s instruction for their kit is to press until the bushing contacts the arm, and that is good advice for any type. Stop as soon as it seats.
3. Put the cross shaft into the arm now, facing the right way, with any washers that belong on the inside. This step is easy to miss. Energy Suspension points out that the shaft has to be in place before the shells go in, because it cannot slide through once they are installed. Global West adds a test: if your shaft will not slide through the bushing hole from the outside, the shaft and its inner thrust washers have to be in the arm before you press either bushing, so check this before step 2. If you are using an offset shaft, orient it the way the maker marks it.
4. Press in the second bushing the same way, with the arm still supported between the flanges.
5. Install the retaining washers and the collar bolts or nuts. For rubber bushings, run them in until they are snug enough to hold the parts together, and stop. Do not torque them yet. For Delrin, follow the maker’s adjustment and cotter pin procedure. For poly, grease every surface the kit calls for, then install the hardware.
6. If you are replacing the upper ball joint, do it now. Drill or grind the rivets carefully without enlarging the holes and bolt in the new joint with the supplied hardware.

Reinstalling the arm

1. Slide the arm onto the frame studs, with each shim stack going back on the stud it came off of, between the frame and the shaft.
2. Install the nuts on the cross shaft studs and torque them to the specification for your car. The 1970 Chevrolet chassis manual instruction, as retyped by Lever Family Racing, torques these with the car still in the air, before the ball joint is connected. Unlike the bushing bolts, these do not preload the rubber.
3. Remove the wire, guide the upper ball joint stud into the spindle, install the castle nut, and torque it to the figure in your manual or the ball joint maker’s instructions. If the cotter pin hole does not line up, tighten a little more to the next slot. Never back the nut off to line up the pin. Install a new cotter pin and grease the joint if it has a fitting.
4. Reinstall the wheel and snug the lug nuts.
5. Lower the car to the ground with the full weight on the springs, engine and front sheet metal installed.
6. Bounce the front of the car a few times to let the bushings settle in their neutral position.
7. Now torque the collar bolts or nuts on the cross shaft ends. Ramps or drive on lift ramps make this easier, but the point is that the suspension must be sitting at ride height.
8. Torque the lug nuts and drive straight to the alignment shop.

Why You Torque Rubber Bushings Only at Ride Height

This is the mistake I see most. When a rubber bushing is clamped, the rubber gets locked to the shaft in whatever position the arm is in at that moment. If you tighten the collar bolts with the car on jack stands and the suspension hanging, the rubber’s neutral position is full droop. When you set the car down, the arm swings up to ride height and every bushing is now twisted and fighting the spring, all the time.

The factory procedure is built around avoiding this. The GM manual steps that Lever Family Racing retyped say to lower the vehicle to the floor, bounce the front end to centralize the bushings, and only then torque the bushing collar bolts. Southern Rods says it plainly in their arm instructions: always leave the upper and lower pivot bushings loose until the weight is on the suspension, because tightening them with the wheels dropped makes the rubber act like the rubber torsion bars used in small utility trailers, and the car sits too high. Preloaded rubber is also working hard all the time, and it tends to give up sooner, so you end up doing the job again.

Polyurethane and Delrin bushings pivot on a sleeve or insert instead of twisting, so ride height is not as critical for them. I still do the final tightening on the ground because it costs nothing and it keeps the habit.

Torque Specs: What the Factory Books Say

I am not going to hand you one number for every A-body, because the factory books do not agree with each other. Here is what I could trace to factory manual excerpts. Use them to understand the range, and confirm with the manual for your year and division.

• 1970 Chevrolet Chassis Service Manual, as retyped by Lever Family Racing for upper arms with bolt style retainers: upper control arm shaft to frame bolts 50 ft-lb, and bushing collar bolts 45 ft-lb with the car on the ground. A Team Chevelle member quoting the service manual lists the same 50 and 45 figures.
• 1969 Oldsmobile Chassis Service Manual, as retyped by Lever Family Racing for upper arms with nut style retainers: shaft to frame 75 ft-lb, and bushing collar nuts 55 ft-lb with the car on the ground. Lever adds that different manuals they read gave figures from 55 to 75 ft-lb for those nuts.
• A Team Chevelle member who checked a 1966 manual reported 75 ft-lb for the upper control arm attaching nuts, which shows how much the numbers moved between years.

For the upper ball joint stud nut, the figures I found range from 40 ft-lb in the retyped 1969 Oldsmobile instructions to 60 ft-lb in Global West’s instructions for their CTA-42A tubular arms, and the retyped 1970 Chevrolet instructions say no figure was supplied. Use your factory manual or the instructions that come with the ball joint or arm you bought. If you have aftermarket arms, shafts, or Delrin bushings, the maker’s instructions win over the factory book. The Lever notes also say to recheck the hardware after 50 miles, and I do that every time.

Cross Shaft Orientation and What the Shims Do

On 1964-1972 A-bodies the cross shaft sits on the inboard side of the frame, and the shims go between the frame and the shaft. That means adding the same thickness of shims at both studs pushes the shaft and the top of the arm inboard, which tilts the top of the tire in, more negative camber. Removing equal shims at both studs gives you more positive camber. Changing the front stack relative to the rear stack swings the arm and changes caster, and usually camber a little too. Chevy Hardcore’s alignment article explains the general rule for inboard and outboard shafts if you want to see it laid out.

This is why counting and tagging matters. If every shim goes back on the stud it came from, the car will usually roll back onto the alignment rack close to where it was. Global West’s own instructions admit that the shop will adjust them anyway, which is true, but a car that starts close is quicker to align and safe to drive to the shop.

A stock shaft goes back the way it came out, which is what your paint mark and photos are for. An offset shaft has a direction printed on it. Get it wrong and you will add camber the wrong way and run out of shims.

Alignment After the Job

Any time the upper arms come off, the car needs a real alignment: caster, camber, and toe. Drive it gently and directly to the shop. Tell them the bushings are new, hand them your shim notes, and ask for the printout before and after. If you have changed to offset shafts or aftermarket arms, bring the maker’s recommended settings. Global West publishes its own caster, camber, and toe recommendations for the CTA-42A arms, for example, and those are different from the factory figures because the arm geometry is different.

If you need to drive the car a short distance first, Chevy Hardcore’s do it yourself alignment article shows how to get camber and toe roughly right with a level, a square, string, and a tape measure. That is a way to get to the shop without scrubbing tires, not a replacement for the rack. Their article also notes that alignment related tread wear can start showing up within a few hundred miles.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

Torquing the collar bolts in the air. This preloads rubber bushings and can make the car sit high and wear out the new rubber early. Final torque goes on with the weight on the wheels.

Mixing up the shims. One loose pile of shims on the floor means a longer alignment and possibly a car that pulls hard on the drive to the shop. Bag and tag every stack.

Forgetting the cross shaft. If both bushings are pressed in before the shaft goes in, you are pressing one back out.

Crushing the arm. Pressing without a spacer between the flanges can bend the eyes so the bushings bind. Support the arm.

Hammering bushings in. Global West says it plainly: you will damage the arm, the bushing, or both. Use a press.

Pushing on the rubber. The driver and the receiving cup have to bear on the steel shell. Push on the rubber and you can tear it or shove the inner sleeve out of position.

Spinning the knurled frame studs. They are pressed in. Press them out if you must, and tap them back in with a drift.

Trusting the floor jack alone. The lower arm is holding back a loaded spring. Use a second jack or stand under it, and consider a chain through the spring.

Swapping left and right arms. They are not the same. Mark them before they come off the car.

Skipping the grease on poly. Dry polyurethane squeaks. Grease every surface the kit calls for, and put grease fittings where you can reach them.

Reusing tired hardware. Old collar bolts, stretched washers, and rusty nuts are cheap to replace and expensive when they back off.

Ignoring the rest of the front end. New upper bushings will not fix a worn ball joint, lower bushings, idler arm, or a sagged frame. Check everything while it is apart.

Related front end and chassis reading on Car Nut Chronicles: if your Saginaw box or pump is weeping while you are under there, our guide to finding and fixing a classic car power steering leak walks through it. If the front end is apart because you are thinking about better brakes, read what actually matters before you buy a drum to disc kit first. For the back of the same car, see how to replace rear drum brake shoes on a classic GM A-body. If the bushings are one item on a longer list, our practical restoration order for a rare muscle car and DIY maintenance basics for older cars help you plan the work.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do I have to remove the coil spring to replace the upper control arm bushings?

No. On 1964-1972 A-bodies the spring sits on the lower control arm, so you support the lower arm with a floor jack and remove only the upper arm. Keep a second support under the lower arm the whole time the upper ball joint is disconnected.

Can I replace the bushings without removing the arm from the car?

Not with factory style or Delrin bushings. Global West’s instructions for its 1012 kit state that the upper arms must be removed, and pressing requires the arm on a bench or in a press. Taking the arm off also lets you inspect the ball joint and the eyes of the arm.

Rubber or polyurethane for a street driven Chevelle?

If you want the car to ride and sound like it did new, rubber is hard to beat, and it is the least expensive. Polyurethane sharpens the steering feel but transmits more road noise and needs grease to stay quiet. Delrin is the most precise and the most involved to install. For a cruiser that sees highway miles, I lean toward rubber.

Is there a difference between the bolt style and nut style shafts?

Lever Family Racing reports that the arms are the same, both styles use the same bushings, and they interchange. The difference is how the bushing washer is held: small bolts into the end of the shaft or a nut on a threaded shaft end. Buy hardware that matches what you have, and check the torque figure for that style in your manual.

What torque do I use on the collar bolts?

It depends on the year, division, and retainer style. The 1970 Chevrolet manual, as retyped by Lever Family Racing, gives 45 ft-lb for bolt style collar bolts, and the 1969 Oldsmobile manual gives 55 ft-lb for nut style collar nuts. Check the manual for your car, and torque them only with the car on the ground at ride height.

Do I need an alignment after replacing upper control arm bushings?

Yes. Even with every shim back in place, new bushings and a reinstalled shaft change the geometry slightly. Get caster, camber, and toe checked right away.

What if the shop cannot get enough positive camber?

Sagging subframes are a known issue on these cars. An offset cross shaft such as Moog’s K5250 Problem Solver, which Southern Rods describes as having a 3/16 inch offset, adds adjustment range. Have the frame and the rest of the front end checked too, because worn lower bushings or ball joints can also eat up adjustment.

Will this fix my wandering steering?

It may help if the bushings were worn, but wander has many causes, including steering box adjustment, the idler arm, tie rod ends, ball joints, and tire pressure. Replace the bushings because they are bad, not as a guess.

Final Checklist Before You Call It Done

• Shims back on the same studs they came off, in the same stacks
• Cross shaft oriented the way it came out, or the way the offset shaft is marked
• Shaft to frame nuts torqued to your manual’s figure
• Ball joint nut torqued, new cotter pin installed, joint greased
• Collar bolts or nuts torqued with the car at ride height after bouncing the front end
• Poly or Delrin bushings greased per the kit instructions
• Lug nuts torqued
• Alignment booked
• Hardware rechecked after the first 50 miles

Final Thoughts

Replacing the upper control arm bushings on a classic A-body is a weekend job that does not need special talent, just order. Support the car on the frame and the lower arm on a jack. Tag every shim. Support the arm in the press and push only on the shell. Put the shaft in before the second bushing. Tighten the shaft nuts in the air and the bushing bolts on the ground. Then let a good alignment shop finish it.

If worn upper bushings were the source of your clunk, you should notice it is gone on the drive to the alignment shop, and a fresh alignment on a tight front end is what makes a Chevelle track the way it did when it was new. That is what you are paying for with an afternoon on the creeper.

When you finish how to replace upper control arm bushings on a GM A-body, write your final shim counts on a tag and keep it with the car’s paperwork. The next person under the car, maybe you, will be glad to have it.

Sources

• Global West Suspension, Del-a-lum upper control arm bushing kit 1012 instructions and CTA-42A tubular upper arm instructions for 1964-1972 A-bodies
• Energy Suspension, general purpose control arm bushing instructions and cross shaft bushing instructions for set 3.3160 (1962-1967 Chevy II and Nova)
• Southern Rods, instructions for 1964-1972 Chevelle tubular control arms
• Moog fitment and specifications for K5196 and K6144 upper control arm bushings
• Eckler’s Classic Chevy, Global West Del-a-lum upper bushing kit with outer stud kit listing
• Chevy Hardcore, do it yourself front end alignment
• Lever Family Racing, GM A-body 1964-1972 control arm installation instructions retyped from the 1970 Chevrolet and 1969 Oldsmobile chassis service manuals, and their notes on the three types of upper control arms (lever-family-racing.com)
• Owner discussions on Team Chevelle (chevelles.com) and the GTO Forum (gtoforum.com) about upper control arm torque figures and bolt versus nut style shafts

For more maintenance and repair guides, see the Car Maintenance Hub.

Featured image: front corner of a red classic Chevrolet Chevelle with chrome Chevelle script and headlights, photo by Luke Jen via Pexels.

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