Thanks for the input, picture below of how it was. I realized that the stock rubber bushings see higher force in my car due to: more horsepower, more weight, more traction, and the thing that likely caused them to shift, higher braking forces attempting to rotate the uprights forward (both were shifted toward the front of the car.) FWIW there was no evidence of the rubber being damaged in any way. It's fairly soft; I stuck a screwdriver through the bushing and was easily able to move it around.
I got the old ones out by using a 1/8" drill and drilling multiple holes down between the upright and steel sleeve (the rubber thing has two steel parts, an outer sleeve and an inner bushing that the bolt runs through, and therefore two areas of rubber.) After drilling a bunch of holes I grabbed the end of the steel bushing with ViceGrips and spun the assembly out.
Tongboy, thanks for the offer of the bushings. However, since I'd been meaning to replace the rubber with spherical bearings anyway, having this happen just sped up the process. Interestingly, the ID of the bore is 1.500", so a 1.500" bearing can be driven into place unmodified. The parts I used came from
http://www.iscracing.net/miatasuspension.html and were bought mostly to save time but also to see how they designed it. The bearing is held in place by two press-in bushings which go on either side of the bearing. They're tack-welded in place and realisticly aren't ever coming out, making the upright a throw-away assembly if the bearing wears out. Since the bearing has a 0.75" bore it's way overbuilt and should last the life of the car. Adaptor bushings reduce that bore down to whatever you want; I drilled and reamed mine to 0.500"
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Midlana book: Build this mid-engine Locost!,
http://midlana.com/stuff/book/Kimini book: Designing mid-engine cars using FWD drivetrains
Both available from
https://www.lulu.com/
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