"Cheap" Robot parts

[Sachiel7]

Ok, here's a quick question guys. We took our pre-season vote to go ahead with my "standard" drive design (yay!)
But it was brought up that the idle shaft's bearings could be replaced with bronze bushings, at a cheaper cost.
I'll be honest here, I've never used bushings before. What's involved with them? From what I understand you need a housing block of sorts for them.
Anyway, I have 2 idle shafts. They dont spin, they provide support for the wheels and chassis. Would it be better to replace the bearings they are on with bushings?
Also, where can you find good, cheap bushings? I checked MSC and had trouble finding some.
I need 4 (one for each support point) and they need to be for 5/8 shaft (I think it's steel) and need an outside diameter no larger than 1 inch.
If someone could help me out, that'd be great. Currently, we have several 4-bolt flange bearings we're using, and they're around $26 each. So, having some of those trimmed off for bushings should help a bit, i'd suspect.
But I don't want to deal with this thing falling apart at competition. We want it to last.