Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums Modifications Suspension Struts are the easiest things to take off !

Yeah lets just say I tried to put my springs on my ride...I got no were couldnt get the strut off...busted my finger and cursed a [censored] load in the hobby shop. Me and my buddy who works on hondas all day (which there was prolly my problem)got every nut and every piece off but couldnt slide the strut up and out. after we tried and tried it would get so close but it would slide right back down into the pocket ! yeah very pissed after 3 hrs of fighting on strut. But I met up with a guy in Stafford Va...Jeff. I was riding through and I saw his Silver SVT at the gas station and i had to ask him 50 Questions like he was my best friend...but i think all svt drivers can click like that. He cut his eibachs a coil and a half...iam pretty sure i wanna do the same thing now...but when i lived in tampa and i would help firends cut stock springs or heat stock springs it was a cheap drop but not a good idea. cutting drop springs...i dont know. LET ME KNOW !

Before the Drop...
All that wheel space inbetween the wheel well makes me sick.

Struts are easy to get off. You need to have a pry bar handy. The fronts you need to leverage the control arm down and it comes right out. The rears you can just pull right off the pearch. Just make sure you aren't standing in front of it. There is also a 'how to' located on this forum. You will need to search to find it.

Changing the geometry of a spring by cutting it is a BAD idea. They were made that height for a reason. Buy the right springs.

Maybe you forgot to disconnect the rear sway bar, i could imagine that would make things a pita.

I take it you mean the front struts, you just gonna pry the crap outta the arm to get it down and get the strut outta there. Cutting your springs a little bit should be OK, but not the best thing to do. My friend cut his lowering springs on his sentra with no problems. If you're using lowering springs, you really should get some good struts like bilsteins or konis, but they cost a good bit. And can anybody photoshop that ugly red thing outta the first pic?

I pryed right into my freakin finger...Iam not one 2 give up....but everytime I take it down to the hobby shop and I put it on the frame lift my finger starts to thump. Is there any way around it or iz the front 2 going to be really difficult ?

I had to loosen the subframe bolts to get the struts out when I changed mine. I loosened all of them some, but I took the ones on the side I was working on out to where there was only a couple of turns left holding them in. Then I pried the control arm down with a big 'ol prybar.

Oh, and while you have it torn apart that far, you might as well replace the sway bar bushings with some urethane ones. You need to drop the rear of the subfame to get at one of the bolts for the bushing mount, so you're pretty much there already. And you don't want to go through all of this AGAIN anytime soon, do you?!? You might check your control arm bushings for cracking/tearing too, for the same reason.

Marty

What worked for me was to use a long pry bar (about 4 foot long), and sit on the end of the pry bar, while I used my hands to maneuver the strut out of the knuckle. It takes a lot of force to move that control arm.

Yep, key is a very long pry bar. Actually getting them out is not the hardest part and you can somewhat knock and pull to just get them out,, but getting new ones in is harder since you gotta get it going in right direction into the strut tower and into the knuckle.
This my help you: http://www.contour.org/mods/mods.php?s=howto&displayid=22

You kinda get the hang of it after you've done it a couple of times. The first one I did must have taken eight hours of beating, banging, prying, kicking, and jacking, using floor jacks, bottle jacks, pry bars, 2 x 4's, and anything else I could get my hands on. Like Kremit said, the problem is not getting them apart, but getting them back together. Just after I finally got my first one re-installed, I discovered that my driveaxle had slipped out in the process, and I had to tear everything apart again. Now that I've changed them about half a dozen times, instead of taking eight hours each, I can probably do one in 7 hours and 40 minutes.

Nah, two hours is plenty.