Lower control arm removal for bushing replacement?

I know this is old but figured I'd post my recent experience and there is no info elsewhere (PM service manual wasn't helpful). Bought parts to do control arms, ball joints, tie rod ends, and strut mounts. Everything pretty straight forward except for the driver's side lower control arm. As the OP mentioned I could not find a way to remove the forward bolt as it hits the transmission. I'm not sure of any other way to get this bolt out other than lifting the motor or mayyybe removing one of the sealed trans covers. Even then it may be tight. Unfortunately I just decided to pass on this one part. I guess that's what happens when engineers retrofit a motor that was not intended to be put in this chassis.

As far as the bushings go. I just bought the complete new control arms from Moog with the bushing already pressed in. Worth saving the headache if you ask me. Passenger side arm was a piece of cake. Just two bolts. Make sure you have a 12pt socket set for removing those two bolts.

I'm replacing driver's side due to broken LCA.

The bolts are torx E24 head, and the forward inner bolt clears the diesel automated manual transmission fine. Maybe the gas auto trans is tighter clearance to remove the front bolt. (There's a reason to choose the diesel! hehe).

I'll report how it goes, after I get the torx socket. The sway bar end link will require jacking the suspension back up to get it back together. And the sway bar end link looks very close to the half shaft, but that could be just the bent/broken LCA..

No trouble really. The ball joint was also loose, probably from the collision, so I replaced that also. The control arm came with bushings in it already. It was a little work to wiggle, tap and pound it into place to line up the bolts through the bushings. I used a block of wood about 1/2" thick to tap the rearward bushing into place. Tap on the top end of the bushing, since the control arm is tipped downward to clear the knuckle and the bushing is tipped outward also. Tapping the top end of the bushing straightens it and lets it slide into the pocket of the subframe.

With a gas engine you have to jack up the transmission a few inches to get the clearance to remove that bolt in one piece. Depending on your model, you may find a bolt in the battery compartment (under the driver's feet) that makes this easier. My suggestion: replace everything on the passenger side yourself. Find a mechanic that will accept customer-supplied parts and have them do the driver's side control arm, then do any remaining components yourself. For me, it was worth the $200 in labor for the piece of mind that I wasn't going to mess up my transmission.

Pressing the bushing is pretty straightforward, but it's only a $100 cost difference for the Moog control arm with their bushings already in it.

Hey everyone. I need this repair as well. Bushings are torn. Couple questions.
1. Anyone recall the website they used for parts? How are they holding up?
2. How bad is it for me to be driving around on a torn bushing? Van seems ok but i really have no idea. Ive done thousands of miles on a torn bushing. Obviously it should be fixed eventually though.

thanks!!