Swisscheese

iTrader: (2)

I am swapping my 2002 Maxima suspension to H&Rs on Illuminas. I have 2 people helping me and we have all day(2 if needed). The problem is we have never done it before, and I just want to make sure I know everything I possibly can. I read through Housecor's site and plan on cutting bumpstops etc, have the spring compressors and I also even picked up a spare front spring isolater at the stealership just in case. I am confident on everything except compression of the spring while removing top hat.

I would rather not get hurt tomorrow, so any advice/tricks for safely getting the top hat off a strut and then compressing a new spring would be greatly appreciated.

I know I am supposed to skip a coil when compressing, someone told me to chain the spring to something when I remove the top hat, so that it doesn't fly off(sounds kind of like a good idea).

Any additional advice would be great though. Help me not hurt myself via ignorance.

Thank you

03on18s

iTrader: (10)

as long as you have McPherson Spring Compressors and have them on tightly, you'll be fine. I've done a few suspesion swaps using them now and I've never had a problem.

UGAd13

Make sure the spring compressors are on the correct way and nice and tight. Also, point the top hat away from you and your buddies and the beer... After you do the first one the rest of them should be no problem.

MaxBoost925

iTrader: (33)

Be careful with compression, haha, i launched one of my top hats

ChromeSE5

iTrader: (3)

Breaker bar... will help a lot when doing rear struts.

chr0nos

iTrader: (1)

make sure you wrap the front cv boots with a few layers of towels or cloths. i cut mine with the bottome of tokcio blues, and had to have the cv joints rebuilt. the way you have to take the strut assembly out, it makes th bottom ride right on the outer cv joint. ditto for putting it back into place.

BEJAY1

iTrader: (19)

Gloves to protect hands when breaking those bolts open. Mini jack under control arm to keep it from falling down BEFORE you loosen 3 strut tower bolts. Rubber plier covers or similar to grab shock piston shaft w/o damaging when removing piston rod nut. Mark strut mounts w whiteout to keep L & R and outer/inner correct (I reversed mine once). Take your time and think things through.

One more thing for anybody searching. Remove your rear seat to get at the strut towers. SO MUCH EASIER than crawling through the trunk.

BRINKLEY

iTrader: (4)

on the breaker bar, this is a must!!!!! Hercules must put all of them on or something.. Just take your time, its not that hard, I did it by myself the first time, took about 6 hours, I can now do it in about 3. IF you have a good drill, it really cuts tightening the spring compressors up. I used a dewalt cordless and it worked fine. You just gotta get the bit that fits a socket, I picked it up at a hardware store for a couple bucks..... and have found it very useful when working on the car. Be sure to use jack stands and make sure you have housecors instructions with you..... You might want to check your boots out before you do this, mine were shredded and I had to order new ones and redo it..... any more questions feel free to ask.. I had a similar thread back the first of the year. I'll try to find it.

Love_00_Max

I changed my front struts yesterday and it took me 4 hrs (first time doing this job).

My back and legs are really sore... But the good thing is I learnt how to do it. Now, I broke my breaker bar while getting the knuckle bolts off. Sprayed some PB blaster, got an impact wrench and a 4 foot steel pipe from Home Depot and then finally the bolt broke loose.

BEJAY1 suggestion for gloves is a must, while I was removing the strut bolts on the top, the wrench slipped and I cut my fingers. Small price to pay for what the dealer was charging me $385 for labor.

Good luck, trust me it is a simple job.

Warik

I did this with a buddy a few weeks ago. Here's what I learned.

#1) BREAKER BAR! You will have difficulty getting some of the bolts off WITH the breaker bar... imagine WITHOUT.

#2) Best place to remove the spring is outside on the grass with the top hat aiming away from you.

#3) You do not need a spring compressor to put the new spring on. Our spring compressor was not short enough to do it, so we just stood the strut up on the grass, put the spring on it and I pushed down while my buddy put the top nut on. Did this for all 4. It saved A LOT of time.

#4) See if you can get your buddy to do the work in the trunk of the car. It was painful to watch my buddy doing it... I would have hated to do it myself. =)

Swisscheese

iTrader: (2)

Well, I got such quick answers that I did the install today and MOST of it went smoothly due to you guy's suggestions. Both my friend and I did get hurt, but it was due to our own stupidity and had nothing to do with spring compression.

I mad the stupid mistake of jacking up the back axle and keeping the jack there while removing the rear struts(HUGE mistake). I get the first strut off and SMACK, there goes the rotor right into my wrist(OUCH). I also managed to REALLY strip the bolt badly when I did this. Had my buddy take me to the store for a replacement(everything worked out well there). I DID manage to get him to do the trunk work(haha, it did look like a real pain). He got a few cuts because he cannot manuevere a ratchet very well.

We had a great set of tools, impact wrench(did not use it on the rods, just used it to break loose the lower bolts to steering knuckle/ rear axle. Got correct torque settings from housecors site etc.

I AM a little concerned about the rear torque because the illuminas came with 2 non-locking bolts and I just put them both on there and tightened them snuggly. There is pretty much no way I can get the torque wrench back in there either.

Front was by far the easiest, however took the same amount of time because we did it first. Rear bumpstops can blow me, took about 30 minutes to get them cut. We ended up using a new blade on a saw-zaw to cut those things.

Gloves were a great idea, really saved my hands(not so much his). Fortunately we did not nead a breaker bar due to impact wrench and good teamwork.

Thank you all very much for all of the help and support. Install went smoothely and I took some insane corners after the install. Car rides like a dream still, and now handles like a race car also.

BRINKLEY

iTrader: (4)

you'll need to take the non locking nuts back off and use your old ones.... the small ones they come with aren't big enough. I'm not sure why they send them, only thing it does is create confusion.... But sorry to say you'll have to remove them and use your locking nut. I'm not sure how you are supposed to torque them anyway. I just got mine as tight as I could.

Puppetmaster

iTrader: (48)

As long as you don't overtighten you will be fine. Its hard to describe pressure/torque, but one way to compare is to tighten the front to spec using the torque wrench and then use a regular ratchet to "feel" how tight that is and try to replicate that on the rears.

Btw, if you use an 11" ratchet extension and go from the opening up top, the rears shouldn't be a problem.

BEJAY1

iTrader: (19)

Yeah, hand tightening those would've been enough for me
http://forums.maxima.org/showthread.php?t=338581

ColdSHO

iTrader: (25)

go slow and have one of those magnet on a stick things. while undoing the upper rear nuts, i managed to drop the nut down into that metal cavern between the rear strut towers, theres lots of space to lose things down there. ull see when ur in the trunk or backseat undoign those bolts.

my first attempt at suspensions was swapping my maxspeed n stockers for my JICs, with a floor jack and hand tools me and a friend who had also never done suspenion work and honestly she just watched me most of the time we finished in a lil over 3 hours.

and yeah, those lower rears strip kinda easy. it was luck we got one of them free.

what kind of compressor are u using?, the two screw type ones or the big scary mouth looking one. i found the mouth style very easy and to use. and they seem much more safe imo.