If the car is an r50/52/53 and the bushings are the original ones....then they are most certainly bad at this point. They are usually toast by around 50k miles.

If things are already apart, then yes I would replace them while you’re in there. Get the Powerflex bushings.....you’ll never need to replace them again.

Good call on lowering the subframe to do the job. I’ve replaced LCAs twice now (on two different cars I’ve owned). First time I left the subframe in place and removed the control arms from the car....leaving the LCA brackets on the car and prying the control off while lying on the ground...... cut the old bushings out, and pressed the new powerflex in myself. Was doable but a big PITA. If you don’t have a lift, this method sucks.

This last time (just recently) I dropped the sub frame to do the job....just unbolted the inner ball joints to get the control arms off along with the LCA bracket still attached. This made it way easier to pry them apart when off the car as a separate unit. I also ordered a set of powerflex bushings already pre-pressed into used brackets from waymotorworks (sent mine back as cores). This method was much easier than the first time even with the extra trouble of dropping the subframe (which wasn’t as bad as I though it’d be).

good luck and happy wrenching!

Here’s a pretty good guide.

https://www.pelicanparts.com/techart...me_Removal.htm

The only issue I ran into was when reconnecting the steering knuckle, the steering wheel had gotten turned while disconnected. When I got the car back together and test drove, I could tell that something was getting strained inside the steering wheel (wiring, etc?) when making a hard right turn. Figured out I needed to disconnect the knuckle, turn the wheel one full rotation left and reconnect.....then was all good. Moral of the story.....don’t turn the wheel (or keep track of how it has turned) while disconnected from the steering rack. You may need to turn it some to reattach the knuckle and/or replace/tighten the pinch bolt. This will make sense when you’re in there doing it.

also, consider replacing your swaybar bushings. You will have complete access to them....they attach using the same bolts that hold the lca brackets on. Swaybar Bushings are cheap. I didn’t do this.....even though mine seem to be fine, I wish I had.

if you run into any problems, give me a PM shout.....I did this a couple of months ago and it’s still fairly fresh in my mind.

What a PITA. You just never know what you’ll run into on cars this age. I recently had some stall issues.....thought it was a bad crank position sensor. Turns out that it had been recently replaced, but the knucklehead of did the job yanked on the wiring and damaged/stretched it. That was a fun repair.