hey there, I ordered some new gas charged monroe struts for my formula and received them yesterday. I would like to know how hard it is to replace them and if their are ways to make it easier. Any one have tips or guidelines to replace the struts? thank you

you WILL need a spring compressor. here in the states you can rent them fro free at most bigger parts stores. its not a hrad job, but it can be dangerous. if the spring compressor lets go, bad things will happen. basicly, takes the wheels off, undo the 2 strut to knuckles bolts. then undo the 3 nuts on the top side. then loosen the top strut nut. now, start compressing the spring. once it compressed enough, take the whole assembly out. now take the top strut nut off, and start realeasing the spring. now it all comes apart easily, and reassemble onto the new strut. once you are done, you WILL need an alignment.

Please let me add to Pyrthian's post. (I am just a shade tree mechanic, but I have replaced struts on several cars in the past few years)

A spring compressor is a must (safety item).

Remove wheels, remove caliper and hang it up out of the way to prevent putting a strain on the brake hose, remove strut to knuckle bolts - make sure you soak them with penetrating oil - these bolts have a habit of rusting in place and sometimes you will need a large drift to drive them out, remove the three nuts on the top of the strut, remove strut from car.

Once the strut is free of the car install the spring compressors on the spring, tighten it enough to take the strain off the top hat of the strut. Then remove the captive nut from the strut shaft - these can be very difficult if you don't have air tools - they will also rust in place and turn the shaft making it most difficult to remove. After you get the captive nut off lift everything off the top of the strut, remove the spring, remove the bottom spring pad. Place all items on the new strut in order and tighten the new captive nut to the required torque. Remove the spring compressor and replace the unit in the car.

You do not need to or necessarily want to release the pressure off the spring until you put the strut hat and captive nut in place unless you intend to replace the spring. Sometimes it can be a real pain to recompress the spring to fit back into the strut assembly if you take it out of the compressor.

While you have the strut out make sure that you check the strut bushing - now would be the time to replace that also.

Hope this helps,
Jeff

Excellent responses, I just did my struts and I made it up as I went along. I did have the spring compressor so I was safe though.

I think air tools are a must for this job, the bolts on the knuckle are pretty tight and it would be quite a workout to get them off. Even after they break free they don't just spin off easily. And the nut on the top of the strut will be difficult to get off unless you have the special socket to hold the shaft from rotating. Or you can get it off with an air wrench.

Here is what I did.
Jack up the back of your car.
Put jack stands under the frame.
Take off tires.
Put jack under the A arm.
Remove the break line from the strut.
Remove the two large nut that attach the strut at the bottom.
Remove two of the three nuts on top of the strut tower.
Pull the two large bolts out of the bottom of the strut.
Let down the jack and remove the last nut on the top.
Remove the spring and strut.
Buy or rent a set of spring compressors and put them on the spring.
Tighten the compressor till the spring is loose on the strut and remove the top nut of the strut.
Slowly remove the compressor.
Put the compressor on the new spring.
Put the spring on the strut and put the top “bucket” in place.
Tighten the nut to the proper torque spec.
Put the plate back on the top and slide the strut into the strut tower and start one of the top nuts.
Lift the control arm till the holes line up in the bottom and insert the two bolts.
Put the other two nuts on the top and torque them down.
Snug up the bottom bolts and put the tire back on.
Do the other side.
Put the car on the ground and look at the tires they should be parallel to each other. If they are angled in or out at the top you will need to loosen the bolts that I told you to just snug up and pull the tire till it is close to being correct.
Get them close and snug up the bolts again.
Jack the car back up and remove the tire and torque the bolts to spec.
Drive the car to an alignment shop and have them align it for you.

Make sure that all the tension is off the sprint before you try to remove the spring compressor. The springs can kill you if you are not careful.

Good luck.

Be sure and get the Monroe strut cam bolts, it makes it much easier to align.
Don

what I did was put the car on jackstands and take off the wheels. Take the nuts off the two lower mounting bolts, remove the caliper, put a floor jack under the trailing arm mount on the knuckle, undue the center nut on top the strut then slowly let the floor jack down. Then I took the three nuts from the top of the tower off to remove the upper plate. At this point you do need to use a spring compressor to compress the spring and mount it on the new strut. Then install the strut and spring assembly. At this point you will need to have the camber on the rear struts set.

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Notchies rule, fastbacks drool

[This message has been edited by jsmorter1 (edited 07-01-2005).]

Harbor Freight has a tool called a camber adjust tool. This thing is nice. If your car is in alignment then you just put this tool on the rotor( has a magnet) and set the scale to zero then remove. when new struts are installed then put the tool back on and adjust the camber to zero and you are back to where you was . does a good job. cost about $10.00
Don

The link in my sig about replacing the rear wheel bearing hubs has a few pics of the strut removal that may help you also.

Steve

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Where will the road take you today?

Some helpful links I've done
How to remove inner door panels, with pics.
How to remove outer door panels, with pics.
How to make rear coil-overs using factory struts, with pics.
How to replace the rear bearing hubs, with pics.

thanks for all the great responses guys, really appreciate it! It was said that I would have remove the brake caliper, do I really have to do that? and can it be done without those special monroe bolts in order to get an eaier alignment? cause I'm gonna have it alligned right after it's done, not gonne do it myself.

I am not sure about removing the caliper, but I don't think so, but you will have to remove the clamp holding the brake line. As far as the adjusting bolts, these will make it much easier for the mechanic to do the align job and if you tell him that you have them on, he may charge you less as it makes it much easier for him
Don

I understand what you're talking about with the bolts, but I live in the Netherlands and shipping stuff from the US over here usually takes alot of time and is a big hassle. Hopefully it can be done without these bolts.

I would just hang the caliper to the side out of the way, do not hang it buy the hose.
Those adjustment bolts are nice but some struts have problems with bolts and nuts with large heads.
I had to grind down part of the lip on my Monroes to get enough adjustment out of them.
Good luck

What I meant was to take the caliper loose from the knuckle and hang it out of the way - not to completely remove it. Once the strut is out you run the risk of the knuckle swinging out and pulling on the brake hose - you want to try to prevent putting any unnecessary strain on the brake hose.

okay, I know what you mean with the caliper. I'm gonna try to do this up coming Saturday so.. hopefully things won't be too hard. thanks for all the help.

quote Originally posted by ka4nkf: Harbor Freight has a tool called a camber adjust tool. This thing is nice. If your car is in alignment then you just put this tool on the rotor( has a magnet) and set the scale to zero then remove. when new struts are installed then put the tool back on and adjust the camber to zero and you are back to where you was . does a good job. cost about $10.00 Don

I used that thing when I changed struts on my gold car. It's a good idea, but it's not precise enough for the task. Because of the interaction between the camber and toe adjustments in the rear, a small change in camber (less than you can read on that bubble level) will make a significant change in toe.

Anyway, I used that level and as precisely as possible duplicated the original settings; the bubble was right in the middle each time. It looked good, then I got my tram gauge and checked the toe setting. 6 degrees off! Had to re-adjust the camber to get the wheels pointed the right direction again...