perfectgecko

So last night I attempted to put the springs on with a friend. Luckily he had a lift at his garage (makes sense later in the story). Putting the rears on was a piece of cake like everyone says. One bolt and the arm lowers and the new spring slides in after lining the bumpers up just right. Took 30 minutes.

Now the front. This part took foreverrrrrrr. And soooo many problems!
The first problem was the nearly welded on 19mm nut holding the strut in place. Took a three tier level arm set to brake it loose after it set in brake loose. (A wrench, a pipe, and a second pipe). After about 30 minutes of trying it broke loose just before rounding it.

The 14 mm bolts weren't to difficult but the space to get the 1.5 inch of thread out sucked. Then the top 3 were simple.
Take the brake line off and feed it through down... Easy enough

Now the devil issue... Eibach' pro springs are progressive in the front... So the spring compressers you would find at the local auto shops to rent (pep boys, oriley's, autozone) won't fit inside the tightly wound part at the top. and when you try to compress the lower section it isn't enough.
So after about 2 hours of trying to get something to work we came up with some pretty aweful ideas. PLEASE don't try these as they were completely UNSAFE in everyway.
1. Tried to put it in place and use a jack to compress the strut and spring using the cars weight. This may have worked it the entire arm didn't move with the strut and made it impossible to manipulate the bolt in order to get the 19mm nut back on.
2. Same method above but using a jack in between the wheel well and arm. I should of taken pictures of this, but the idea was to oppose the arm and strut in opposite directions to get the bolt to fit in.
I know what your thinking... Stupid right? What isn't seen is how would you know if the strut was in the groove at the top to be able to get the nut back on... So many things wrong with these ideas.. So we scrapped em and tried the next one Now it worked, but was really stupid.

3. Compress the spring as much as we could .. Then Used the hydrolic lift to press the top plate down just enough to get the nut on a few threads... So if you can picture this... Someone is holding the strut underneath the lift while a portion of the spring is being compressed with the lift legs.. First thing is the strut could of slipped from the bottom from the pressure forced downward..(since of course the bottom section is round and not flat). And in fact I could feel it bow during a few attempts.. It took several tries to get it just right holding pressure on the other side and finally got the nut on.. Then impacted it to get it on properly.

So voila the springs were on and now all that was left was reassemble.
Easy compared to the hours spent trying to make it work.

Moral of the story .. Get a shop to compress the springs for you and don't attempt this at 5pm on a Sunday when there is nothing open!

Saying all of this I have noticed one problem.. On the drivers side inside the engine bay I can hear some type of knocking when going slowly over bumps, but not at higher speeds... I'm really unsure of what could cause this. I checked all the nuts and bolts at the bottom and they are secure.. The noise is coming from the top driverside in the engine bay. anyone with some insight as to what it could possibly be would be very helpful.

jgronline

iTrader: (3)

Inside? The spring compressors go on the outside of the springs like this:

perfectgecko

Yes exactly ... They fit the factory springs perfect... But if you look at the front springs from the eibach pro kit .. They are progressive and the distance between the coils on the top portion is to tight to fit the compressors in... I don't have a picture to show you but I'll try to find one

I should clairify what I mean by "inside" I mean I between the coils of the spring itself .. Not a coil spring conpresser

perfectgecko

The one on the far left is just like the front spring for the g37... This is the one I had so much trouble fitting a spring compresser in between the top section.





This is the spring compresser that someone made and would of worked much better. I just didn't have a way to fashion something like this at 8 pm Sunday night

jfisher

Did you orient the front springs in the seat of the strut correctly? That could be your knocking noise up front. If the springs aren't seated all the way they could be shifting creating the knocking on bumps that you're hearing.

MaQG37

iTrader: (4)

For your knocking, more than likely, the 3 12mm nuts that hold the strut at the top through the engine bay are loose or you forgot the gasket that sits at the top of the strut. After the car has settled, you need to re-torque those top 3 bolts to factory spec. That can cause the noise or the missing gasket.

perfectgecko

I may have missed that.. I was tired ... I'll check that when I get off... Funny you mention that gasket... It got left off the passenger side by accident but but stayed on the driverside.. And the driverside is where I hear the noise.... How important would you consider that gasket?it felt like a really thin piece of paper

MaQG37

iTrader: (4)

It's very important, I've done that on all 4 sides of my car. The rears knocked at low speeds when I putting on me OEM suspension on. Low and behold, gasket missing. I made a makeshift gasket from plumbing gasket material from Home Depot for $5. It's been quiet ever since.

perfectgecko

Not sure if we're talking about the same one... This one is a red triangle shapped one that would be inside the wheel well pressed against the metal..

MaQG37

iTrader: (4)

Yup, that's it.

perfectgecko

So just to squeeze it back on do you think I would be able to raise it up and just unbolt the the nuts and drop it down enough to fit it back on?

iCrap

iTrader: (8)

I had the same problem, the spring compressor wont fit over the progressive part on the springs. I just took the whole assembly over to a shop and had them compress it on there.

MaQG37

iTrader: (4)

I'm not sure if that would work, maybe since they are OEM struts and not coilovers..they aren't that stiff where you can put pressure down on the strut to get clearance. I just removed the whole assembly to once-over everything.

perfectgecko

Good idea... So I had it at a shop this morning to get it aligned ... The bolts were loose on the driverside engine bay... So that was taken care of.... But low and behold somehow I didn't even think to inspect the toe rods in the back or anything... And both of them are bent...(not from me) had to of been the previous owner I would suspect.
But gives me a good excuse to buy the adjustable ones... Also the ball joints in the front are bad which was adding to the noise and slightly bumpy experience driving I would assume.
Do you think it would be ok to just buy the rear adjustables for now? Or is better to buy the front control arms with the rears? I don't plan on going any lower or doing any auto road or anything... Just a dd that likes to flex muscle every once in a while (someone else said that on this forum and it's awesome)

Hugh Anderson

It did take me about that long to put mine on also. The front was just a headache. But I have a Question if anybody can answer me. My friend bought me Eibach springs on Craigslist. I put it on without checking. Come to find out its for a 370z and I have G37x. My pro kit should of been 6394.140 and I put on 6393.140. Soviet plz tell me I'm not gonna ruin my car. Only thing I noticed is it sits a little lower in the back