I ordered a bunch of parts for thepartsbin.com last year.

So far, the parts that have gone bad (30K miles)
-a pvc oil trap hose has gone bad (it got tiny cuts all over it (rubber hose)
-oil cap gasket (began leaking again)
-engine mount (changed last april) (this is a bitch. It's the oil filter side one. It shurk and has dipped in. I barely have less than a few mm of clearance left between the oil filter and the mount. I can't even fit in an oil strap wrench on the filter. Utmost care in not allowing any oil on the mount during oil changes. The previous mount was ok, and I just changed it as maintance). Kind of pissing me off as I removed one eye hook of the engine when I'd removed the intake manifold. And I don't like the idea of jacking up the engine from the oil pan.

Haroon -- my sympathies. I had very bad luck with r.t.a. bushings from FCP Groton. However, the motor mounts which I got from them (I'm *pretty sure* it was them...) several years ago are holding out just fine.

Oil cap gaskets -- I got three from Volvo, and two of them are wheeping already after 6 months. Go figure...

Rob

I was contemplating getting the r.t.a bushings from fcpgroton and that scares me. I already have front end bushing and am keeping a close eye on them.

Hi, again, Haroon!

In Sept. 2000 I bought an '87 244 which 'had issues'-- it needed a new cat, a new exhaust system, and new r.t.a. bushings, among other things. I quickly zipped an order off to FCP/Groton. The cat and exhaust (Starla) went on just fine. The r.t.a. bushings were German, as I recall, and were of a different design than the ones I've seen before. The central bolt bore was much larger in diameter than stock/IPD/RPR bushings, and there were three bosses inside each end to centralize and hold the mounting bolt. The bolt fit was sloppy, but I went ahead and installed them in order to get the car past inspection and get it registered. I replaced these bushings with some from IPD this December. The FCP bushings ultimately chewed up the mounting bolts, and they clunked right from the start.

On each of these occasions I rented 'the tool' from Duane Hoberg to extract the old ones and install the new. The FCP bushings when they were new went in like butter -- very little resistance. When it came time to extract them, I kid you not, I was able to press them out with my fingers -- I didn't even need the tool. That suggests to me sloppy tolerances, and I'm thankful that the slop in their fit didn't chew up the mounting 'ears' on the axle.

Lesson learned -- I'm sticking with r.t.a. bushings which IPD/RPR/Volvo sells. They cost twice what FCP charges, but the FCP r.t.a. bushings were unsatisfactory. That's no bargain.

Rob Kuhlman