Well, just finished with the replacement. I just said screw it and went with the Energy Suspension kit (black) and a good coating of Super Lube on all components. Most bushings were still pretty good for 16 years old with 185k miles, outside of the two just behind the front wheels on either side. The lower halves were toast and flexed way more than the rest and even crumbled a little bit.
My Tahoe has been in the south its whole life (East NC), so rusted bolts were not a concern. It took minimal effort with a 2’ breaker bar to break everything free. That said, a word to the wise for anyone doing this: it took me about 4 hours of casually going through the process (could easily cut it to 1.5-2 hours if I did it again), with an hour easily going towards removing the bolt from the bumper radiator support bushing on the passenger side. The bolts in the front have fat washers and I couldn’t get it around the AC line that runs right above it. Finally got a work-around where I pried up on that tubing (VERY carefully) just enough to wiggle the bolt at an angle to get it out.
Save yourself the hassle and go that route if you want, but be aware that you are adding stress to a sensitive component.
Torqued everything to 50 ft-lbs with blue thread locker once all bushings were in place. All clearances around body panels / door jambs are consistent as well after the repair.
As far as road manners go, I only did a brief test drive. I’ll have a more thorough update tomorrow with my work commute but I definitely feel the road more. It’s not significant enough to upset me: I’d consider it similar
to that rumble/vibration feeling you get when driving a golf cart on asphalt. Just enough of a hum but nothing annoying. Granted, these vehicles are not Town Cars and I do have the stiffer Z71 shocks so YMMV.
I will say that the road feel is something I’ll easily forget about, but damn can I feel this transmission shift haha
