There "seems" to be a difference between the ls/lt part and the ss part, don't know for sure. Also, there is a seemingly identical part for Cobalt that is stamped steel instead of cast alloy, again I don't know if that makes a difference or not. The geometries are the same just different materials for the rigid parts.

If you replace only the bushing, you will probably get a beefier bushing. The replacement part is solid rubber, the OE part has cut outs in it. I don't know the difference.

This is one of the cases of Cobalt isn't exactly an HHR.

 

I went for aftermarket units http://www.autozone.com/autozone/par.../N-jnwc6Z8oz70 - the bushings looked identical to the old ones. I did browse to see what was available for just the rear bushing alone, and there seemed to be some semi-solid ones (Like OEM) and also some that looked like they were solid.

Hard to say which would be better.

 

I am starting this process now. Just wondering after looking at it on the jacks, how did you get control arm out when there is about 1/8" between the rear part of the control arm and the sway bar?

 

The arm kind of pops out with a bit of pushing & prodding once you disconnect everything.

 

Man am I kind of screwed now. Was no problem pulling out and replacing new one, but when I go to put rear bolt up into rear bushing it won't go all the way in, and usually falls back out. Yep, everything is lined up. I even took the arm back out and put bolt up through, and it gets finger tight, and put a socket on it and gets loose again and falls out, kind of like it is stripped. Here's a picture of the end of the bolt which looks funny, but doesn't look like it is broke. Only thing I can think of is getting a new bolt and trying that, but don't know if that is a dealer item only, or if I can get one at the parts store. I took it loose with an impact gun.

 

It sounds like it's not threading on far enough. Is there any way to hand-turn it a bit more?

BTW, if you were doing this last night in MI, you are made of hardier stuff than I am. It was 0* here this morning! I have front-end work to do, too, but it's not happening here until it's at least 40* out...

 

Yea, I was working on it outside till about 9:30pm, then gave up because bolt wouldn't go in. Had control arm in, but don't know why bolt won't go. Can't be cross threaded, because it won't even go more than 2-3 turns by hand. I'm in Canton, just west of Michigan Ave. & I275.
The main problem is the rear bolt on the control arm. Shoves through about 3/4 of the way, threads by hand about 2 or 3 turns, tightens up, that when you put a socket on it, you can see it shove back out about the same amount of turns that you had just hand tightened. Went to dealership and got a brand new 14mm bolt and does exactly the same thing. I can reach my arm over the axle and tie rod, and stick my fingers back in the frame where the retainer for that bolt is, and when it tightens up hand tight, it is just starting to come through the top side of the retainer.
Is there a chance that since just the right side is jacked up, that the frame could be just twisted enough to cause an alignment problem? Was going to try jacking up the driver side also, but have jack holding up the steering knuckle. If I let it down, it puts pressure on the control arm, so I can't do that.

 

Could be the arm just needs to be raised a bit. I think I remember having to put a jack under the ball joint. I'm old and that was 2 years ago, and I am fortunate to have a garage when it's freezing outside. That odd end on the bolt is for a pilot into the captured nut, if it's warm enough to take your time and wiggle it around it should go in. I hate doing this kind of stuff in the cold!

Otherwise You may need to take the front frame off to get to the captured nut to replace it, I hope that you don't have to replace the entire frame to do that.

 

Nope won't wiggle in. I even tried several times running bolt up without the arm in place. Just won't go for some reason. Thought that having only one side may have twisted the frame just enough to get the holes off, but jacked up other side too, so that wasn't it either. I'm at a loss for words. Bad thing is I can't get it back together with this problem to take it to someone even if I wanted to (which I don't), and can't even tow because front of car is facing garage door.

 

I've found that the ball joints in aftermarket control arms are garbage, & fail in 10,000 to 20,000 miles. You'll know they are bad when you get loud clunks from the front end & funny tire wear. Then, you have the wonderful job of grinding the heads off the rivets & driving the old ball joint out, & replacing it with a quality aftermarket joint like Moog. The Moogs have a grease fitting & seem to last a long time. I've drilled the bottom of the aftermarket joints & installed a grease zerk, but they still fail quickly, even when greased regularly. Last time I did a new aftermarket control arm, I removed the new ball joint & installed a Moog ball joint to save myself grief down the road. Its much easier to replace the joint on the workbench! The whole arm goes in a lot easier too, as you can leave the bolts that hold the joint to the arm loose when installing the arm. This makes lining everything up a lot easier. The bushings do seem to hold up the same, although I did have a steel arm break a weld & fold up under the car. Fortunately for me, I was going less than 5 MPH!! Maybe its worth the $$$ to use dealer parts rather than cheap aftermarket chinese stuff.

My experiences are with cars other than the HHR, but the quality of aftermarket arms all seems to be the same from what I have seen.