'99 K2500 Suburban Lower Control arm bushings

[Zeke's Garage]

Hello all,

My 'Burb has about 150k miles on it, and is in desperate need of all new front end bushings, ball joints and rotors. Well I've pulled apart the driver's side tonight, ready to replace the bushings in the lower control arm, and found that the replacement bushings are too big to fit into my control arms. The bushings that I pressed out did not have the metal 'sheath' around the rubber, the rubber was just pressed into the arm. I've double checked the part numbers of all the local auto parts stores, and every one of them calls for the part numbers that I have. I did notice that most of the descriptions are for use in a 'stamped' arm. Well my arms are heavy cast, but I can't find any mention of it anywhere.

I'm going to talk to the parts department at my local dealer in the morning, but just wanted to see if anyone else had run into this problem and had any other solutions... I'm partly tempted to cut the metal sleeve off the bushings i have and press them in just to see what kind of noise they make...

Thanks!

Shawn