Strut And Spring Install, Who's Done It And How Hard?

[Alvito]

I think my SE-R needs new struts and springs. The ride is really rough when going over bumps and potholes.

Can I just replace 2 at the front? Or should I replace all 4?

[Cman]

What mileage are you at?? Being a SE-R your ride will be rougher than a regular SE. That suspension is supposed to be firmer on the strut and spring calibration and you're also running on 17" rubber with a low profile sidewall so your ride will have a huge difference compared to a lower line Sentra.

[Original Mr Sentra]

Man, I miss working on the ride. With the struts and springs together as a unit should only take you an hour with the right tools.

[scottybones]

I used Monroe quick struts so didn't have to deal with spring compressors. I've used them before and they aren't as easy as some people say they are. Once you find the right placement, it's easy, but takes a little time to find exactly where to line them up. The hardest part was getting the bolts off, which quite frankly was a PITA. Might want to think about cutting off the old ones and replacing them to help save time.
I personally don't like the Monroe's and regret not taking the time to pull the springs off and using a better quality strut. They are much too soft and although the ride quality is improved, don't like it. My thinking was that if the springs were bad then I just wasted a bunch of time and have to do it all over again. Plus, it was cheaper to replace the unit in one shot than it would've have been to buy struts and new mounts.

[Cman]

I did the back ones this morning, wasn't too bad and all my fasteners came off no problems. Gives me hope on the front that I will be able to get them off.

I will try the fronts tomorrow, going to Princess Auto and picking up a spring compressor so I can do a slight mod to the strut mount and reuse my STB. Stay tuned.

[Cman]

Finished up the fronts this morning, it went well with some minor issues. Again all fasteners came off no problem giving them a soak with the rust penetrant before loosening them.

Couple of things:

1.) The OE struts have an extra bracket that the Monroe struts don't have for the ABS sensor wiring. This bracket is held by a 10mm bolt behind the strut and then a few inches towards the rotor side is where a grommet pops into another bracket to hold the sensor wiring in place. I just popped the sensor wiring into the bracket where the grommet goes and left the other bracket unattached. Not a big deal since further up the chasis the wiring is held again by a different bracket onto the inner fender well.

2.)My strut tower brace, right now it is off the car. The longer stud pops off the old mount with a few whacks of the hammer then using my spring compressor compressed the spring till I can zip off the strut nut and removed the mount. When I did this on the old mounts all the ball brgs went flying everywhere. You have to be really careful that you don't disturb them when removing the mount. Since I didn't want to chance doing that on the new assys. I decided to just install them without the brace for now until I can get my buddy (shop foreman at a Honda dealer) to drop by my place and assist me in undoing the mounts on the new setup to install the longer stud and then reattaching my STB. Removing these assys. again will be a lot easier the second time around.

3.) It's a real PITA to line up the bottom strut bolt holes with the knuckle to get the bolts through, even just being a little bit off will not let the bolt go through. A second pair of hands will help here.

Oh, I also had 2 broken front coil springs. I will take a look to see if the back springs might be broken too.

So the install is done (sort of). I will now get the car to another shop for an alignment and a more detailed check of the rest of the suspension. I will need to replace front sway bar bushings and end links and probably ball joints. I'll let the shop deal with that part of it.

Will post up some pics of the old stuff that got removed later and will report back on how it rides also. All in all not too bad of a job done in the driveway (the right tools and air compressor really helps).