removing struts and spring

[cowsareholy]

when i remove the front and rear struts and springs to replace with monroe quick struts do i have to compress the springs on the struts im removing if im taking them out together or do they come out all together in one piece like the quick struts without compressing them?

thanks

 

[mlatten]

For both the front and rear, there are 3 nuts on top of the tower (you can't miss them) that need to be loostened first. Then, by whatever variation or means you see fit, remove the bottom of the shock from the spindle via the one 21mm (?) bolt - good luck w/ that. Just unbolt what you see or think needs to be unbolted and improvise from there - everyone has his/her own extraction plan, hehe.

Then, once the strut tower is removed from the car (it'll be the shock, with the spring compressed atop it with a mounting plate keeping the pressure) you can compress the spring and go from there. Compressing the spring while it's still in the car does you no good, and it can be dangerous.

Best of luck, and keep asking questions, as it's really the best way to learn other than actually tearing into it.

Hope this helps,

Matt

 

[YAHTEC]

Dont take off the 3 nuts off of the top untill you have the bottom portion seperated from the knuckle then proceed to removing the 3 nuts on the top!
whatever you do, DONT remove the big nut in the center, you will be very very sorry.

 

[noSHO4u]

Since you are putting quickstruts in, you do not have to mess with any spring compressing on the new hardware because it all comes pre-assembled.

And since you are replacing all of the old hardware, you do not need to compress the old stuff either. You will take out the strut/spring combo as a 1 piece dilio, and put the new quick strut in as a 1 piece dilio.

Having never done the suspension before until these past few weeks, it is fairly easy once you battle all of the rust monsters. For me it has been a very challenging battle to get the old stuff off. Putting the new hardware on is a breeze because everything is so clean and nuts and bolts are actually separate pieces and not fused together

Get a can (or 2) of PB Blaster and drench everything that looks like it should turn. And get a can of heat just incase something is really stubborn. And get a sawzall in case the heat doesnt work.

The only problem I ran into so far with the quickstruts was that the coat of paint on one of them made them just a shade thicker than the struts I just removed, so sliding them into the knucle proved to be a challenge at one of the corners, but prying the knuckle open a little further did the trick. If you are gonna leave the knuckle on the car when you do your swap, this may end up preventing the strut from just sliding back into the knuckle as you would expect it to.

 

[sdpatt]

The easiest method I have used for removing the knuckle from the strut is to using a 1.5-ton bottle jack with the jack base on the ****** of the knuckle and the top of the shaft under the lower spring perch. The leverage and application of force that is in-line with the direction of motion allows the jack to slide the knuckle off the strut without even using an extension handle. You will still need to push the knuckle downward to clear the base of the strut. As long as you have loosened the three screws on the top of the strut, the base can be easily moved to clear the knuckle.

 

[jelloslug]

I installs quick struts on my SHO not long ago. I had the best luck removing the old one by greasing what I could of the part that is going to slid back through the knuckle (this works better on the rears) and using a jack to press them out. When I installed them I greased the new struts and the hole in the knuckle. That made installing the new struts a breeze.