ST Coilover install
After many weeks of my new coils sitting in my living room, and two failed attempts at install, I finally have the new coil overs on! I drove about 20 miles tonight and the ride feels good. I feel more connected to the ground but this means I feel the little bumps a little bit more. The overall balance of the suspension feels great: definitely stiffer than stock but not too stiff and all in all pretty comfortable!
Now on to the install and some pics!
I relied on
RockerDan's DIY for almost the full install and it was very thorough. I replaced the stretch bolts with new ones from the dealer as well as brand new bearings just to be safe! First, we jacked up the car and followed all the steps for the front end. Make sure if you are using a strut spreader tool (which I would HIGHLY recommend!) that you do not place it in the clamp too far: It hits the lip that sticks out of the strut when you try and remove it. We figured this out during the second attempt at installing. I knew going into this that the passenger side strut was going to be harder to remove so we rejoiced after we got past that part!
"Hmmm. Is this the right one or the left one?" :lol:
New fronts during install. Just finger tightened the bolts underneath the rain tray and ready to move on to seating the new strut in the clamp. Collar is spun all the way down for ease of install.
The rest of the front install was smooth so on to the rears! These were pretty straight forward except for one part where we had to improvise. The lower strut bolt is on there so freaking tight! There's no room for a breaker bar so we hammered on the handle of the wrench when it was on the bolt and it eventually loosened up. We thought we were all set until we had to tighten it back up and hitting the wrench "upward" was not working. I then suggested to my friend helping me that we should use the floor jack and "jack up the wrench!" It totally worked, and that was awesome.
Now for some before and afters. My stance is a little goofed up right now b/c we did not have time to adjust it but will hopefully do that soon. I measured when I got home tonight and right now I'm sitting at:
Front Drivers: 24 7/8 FTG
Front Passengers: 25 1/8
Rear Drivers: 24
Rear Passengers: 24
That is all the way down in the back and the difference in the front is really surprising b/c I believe I set them both at about 5 threads showing underneath the collar...It should not be that different so I will definitely check that out tomorrow. I will probably bring the front down closer to 24 1/4 and I'll bring the back up a bit.
Before:
(the rear at stock height)
After:
(the rear all the way down)
You can really see the backwards lean in this one!:
We took our time and it was a good 6-8 hour job. Now to set up an alignment appointment for this week! :thumbup:
Also, I'll get some better pics in the daylight once it's all leveled out and the stance is correct and I'll update about how the ride feels and the performance of the coils once they have had some time to settle!
