My Progress springs should be delivered to my house tomorrow. I have seen the how-to guide on here for installing them yourself but I wanted the opinion of people here that have done it. I know how to do general work on a car like an oil change, but this is a lil more complicated of course. Was it a hassle or is the how-to guide pretty good? Also, how long did it take you?

 

not hard at all. for someone that has never done it, still shouldn't take more than a few hours.

 

i found it very easy. take your time and dont rush.

 

Like they said, the install isn't bad. Halfcent's how-to is pretty easy to follow. The only problem I had was getting the top bolt off of the strut hub, but that is probably because the shop I had do springs before on my car had used an impact.

 

It depends on your point of reference. Not hard for me is striping a car all the way down to its last nut and bolt and rebuilding it from the ground up. For some doing a brake job is hard.

Whats your level of experence?

 

its is if u have the right tools

 

pice of cake....I can get em done in about 30 mintues

 

Air tools and spring compressors as long as your are mechanically inclined shouldn't take more than a couple of hours and a couple of beers

 

easy!

x2!!!!

 

I can do things like oil changes and changing brake pads no problem but I've never done anything more than that.

 

You'll be fine then. Thats basically all the experience I had before doing my springs.

 

just got a side question to ask, sorry dont mean to change topic of the thread... after you install springs do you need to do an alignment? and how do you do that??

 

lol someone show this thread to my dealer. I had them replace the struts, get the car back and when i hit a bump... loud clang news from the front right.

So naturally I see what they did wrong . Spring isn't seated right, tension bar from the sway-bar to the strut assymbly wasn't even bolted up all the way... I would gladly fix it myself, but damn I wanna see if THEY can do it. lol

Also the strut mount I am sure is a goner now too .

 

yes, you do. the toe will be off, IIRC.

 

Yeah. The camber on our cars isn't the issue, but the toe should be off just slightly.

For future notice...
Anytime you take the suspension loose... springs, struts, control arms..etc etc. It is WISE to get an alignment

 

Is an alignment easy to do?

 

I don't think you have the equipment to do it yourself as it need to be put on an alignment rack.

Take it to sears of Jensen Tire or whatever your local tire shop is and they can do it for like $30-50 depending on your area. Let them know the car was just lowered and the toe is all that needs adjusting and they might do it cheaper

 

I don't know how to do it but yes, you will need to get an alignment done.

Ok next question: Do I have to buy an impact wrench or can I rent those also somewhere?!?!?

 

You shouldn't need an impact wrench... it makes the job quite a bit easier, but it's not required. With the top mount of the strut mount... just use a breaker bar while it's still on the car. Crack it loose but DO NOT untighten it all the way, it's what's holding the compressed spring... compressed. Then once off the car you can hook up springs compressors and finish taking it off.

As far as renting them... possibly but i doubt it at Autozone. Just checked online and that's a no go.

 

can you run on stock struts? i heard that they blow after a while

 

They do blow after awhile. Most people run them from 1 to 1.5 years until the stock struts go bad give or take a few months. I plan on getting koni struts in August.

 

around how much do those konis cost?

 

anywhere from $500 to $700 depending if you can get a deal somewhere.

 

pretty pricey lol thats the only thing thats stopping me.