| We
decided to jack each corner of the car as we worked on it instead
of the entire front/rear at once. Before jacking the car, open
the hood. Place your jack under the car (we're using a piece of
wood to spread out the weight on the frame and prevent damage)
and place a jackstand as pictured. |
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| Remove
the front wheel for access to the suspension. |
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| Start
by removing the brake caliper. There are two bolts holding the
caliper in place. Use a socket on the back side and an open end
wrench in the slot to prevent rotation of the nut. Here we show
both the top and bottom bolts being removed. |
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| After
removing the brake caliper, tuck it up out of the way. There is
a convenient place to set it right behind the strut as shown.
|
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| Next,
remove the ABS harness from its retainer clip (if ABS equipped)
behind the brake rotor. This will ensure the harness does not
snag when lowering the suspension. |
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| Placing
the jack under the A-arm, preload the suspension by raising the
jack until it just begins to raise the suspenion. This step
is essential to prevent injuring yourself or damaging the car! |
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| Now,
move up under the hood. Here we will be disconnecting the strut
from the strut tower. be sure to scribe the location of the factory
caster/camber plate prior to loosening anything! Once the
location has been marked, remove the two nuts and one bolt that
secure the strut in place. If you have properly preloaded the
suspension, there should be little or no movement of the suspension
while you do this. |
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| With
assistance, slowly lower the jack and suspension, ensuring that
the strut does not snag on the car as it comes down through the
wheel well. Once the jack is all the way down, you may need to
compress the strut by hand to get it all the way out of the wheel
well. When finished, your setup should look like this. |
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| With
assistance, slowly lower the jack and suspension, ensuring that
the strut does not snag on the car as it comes down through the
wheel well. Once the jack is all the way down, you may need to
compress the strut by hand to get it all the way out of the wheel
well. When finished, your setup should look like this. |
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| With
the strut out of the way, reach in and pry the lower coil of the
spring from the A-arm. You may need to use a pry bar for this.
There will be very little energy stored in the spring at this
point, so once it pops out of its recess, it won't shoot off at
you! |
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| Transfer
the isolators to the new spring. Be sure to install them just
as they were on the factory unit. |
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| The
new, shorter springs fit with little difficulty. Be sure to reinstall
the spring in the same position as the original. The rubber isolators
will leave marks on the A-arm which will help you locate the proper
coil position. |
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| Now
the tricky part. With the help of an assistant, start raising
the suspension up into the wheel well. This will require compressing
the strut once again and locating it in the strut tower. While
raising the suspension, you will also need to ensure that the
end link for the sway bar is placed into the sway bar as the suspension
is raised. |
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| You
will also need to ensure that the two studs on the strut are aligned
and enter the holes in the strut tower without binding. Once the
studs on the strut are about 50% into the holes in the strut tower,
stop raising the jack. |
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| Install
the nut and bushing on the sway bar end link and tighten it until
it stops turning. We like to use German torque (goodentight) values.
At this time you can reinstall the brake caliper and ABS harnessS. |
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Under
the hood, ensure the caster/camber plate is aligned with your
original scribe marks. Snug down the two nuts and one bolt on
the strut. once snug, raise the jack a bit to compress the strut
and retorque the strut. You can now reinstall the wheel and lower
the car. Repeat this process for the other front spring.
Now wasn't that easy?
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