Me and 3 of my buddies attempted to put on my Prokits and tokico blues in today and everything went smoothly except for one thing. We cannot get the sway bar connector to the dampener fork loose. In order to get that thing loose (which I'm sure you all know) you have to socket that bitch out of there while holding the back of the bolt with a 14mm wrench. The porblem is that the part that you hold with the wrench is stripped. Normal size vice grips wont work either. I don't know what to do. This only happened on one of the wheels, the other three were cake especially the back ones. Please help a brotha out. tia

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hmmm...try and find a small pipe wrech to get on the stripped out nut. They work much better than vise grips, that is if you can get a really small pipe wrench in there...next step is to cut or torch off the nut...no fun there..

ok, edit: are you talking about the damper fork, or the sway bar end link that connects to the fork? If thats the case, my car had the 14mm nut on one end, and on the other, to keep the joint from just turning, there was an allen head hole in the end link to hold it still while loosening the nut..dont know if this helps at all..

13.5 @108 MPH-2.2 60ft(stupid FWD!)
S16G @ 18 PSI/FMIC/Running on MegaSquirt II (Now with sequential
fuel injection)
My webpage: http://eclipsed4evr.home.comcast.net
-1998 Mitsubishi Eclipse RS-T- "Toy"
-1992 Plymouth Laser Turbo AWD(SOLD)
-2000 Honda CR-V(daily)

Yea that's the part, that little piece that connects the sway bar to the dampener. I didn't think of checking on the outside for an allen key hole. Can you get to it by just sticking your finger behind the bolt? I thought that there was a little black rubber cap thing back there. I'll look at it tommorrow. Shit I have 3 shocks and springs and this one fing corner has to screw it up.

You would be talking about the back of the thing marked "sway bar link" right?

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Yeah, that part is a pain in the arse. Mine was rusted and the bolt would not come off. I had to lock some vice grips in place, put an allen wrench inside the front of the bolt, and then turn the nut with a cresent wrech. Man, talk about a hassle! Took me a good hour to get the sway bar disconnected from the dampner fork.

Give that a shot. I went to Advanced Auto and grab an assorted size of allen wrenches. Finally found one that fit.

The back part of the rubber is like a joint that connects to the sway bar. It rotates with the the bolt so you gotta somehow clamp the back to keep it from moving then find a way to get a grip on the nut that connects them. I'm sure you know all this from doing the other side but really the only way to clamp it down is to force a small pair of vice grips in there to keep it from moving.

Hope this helps a little. Good luck!


<Edit> I realized I just told you pretty much what XtremeRS told you. Thats really the only way I can see to get it off.

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Stock appearing 1999 RS
"Its what you don't see thats gonna beat you..."

I didnt have to remove that, I was able to loosen everything up enough to pull the shock out without removing that, I also couldnt get it off either. But it is possible to remove the shock without doing that

1998 dodge avenger 4 cyl AT
Mods are:
Not enough

You got the strut assembly out without taking that bolt out? Wow, I thought about trying to do that, but didn't see how it was possible. Is the Avenger suspension the same as the 2GNT? I should try that shit tommorrow. Now, where is the allen head exactly? Behind the bolt underneath the rubber piece? As of right now I have the front driver's side done and the two backs done. I drove it home from my buddy's garage which was maybe a 4 mile drive. This morning I thought that it might be alright to take it to work. When I got to a stop sign by my house, I heard a loud squeak sound coming from the front driver's side wheel (the one with the prokit on). The sound came at the same time every wheel revolution, so it wasn't constant. Right now, with my car sitting outside, when I turn the wheel left to right, I hear the deep squeak. Any ideas? I'm thinking that as the driver's side spring settled a bit overnight, the front of the car became a bit lopsided and that noise is a result of an uneven amount of pressure on one of the suspension parts. I dunno. I don't have to work tommorrow so I'll be hacking away allllllll day. Any ideas or comments at all feel free....... tia

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The squeaking probably has to do with the amount of weight transfer on the left side vs. the right side.



It's been about a year since I tore my suspension down so from what I remember, I think I jammed an allen wrench in this part of the bolt. The pic kinda sucks cause I made it a little small but the very front of the bolt is what I am talking about. Allen wrech in the front of the bolt, vice grips on the back in front of the joint, and then a cresent wrech to take the nut off.

So it would look like this if you were talking it off AW|CW,B|VG

I think it would be possible to take the suspension parts out without removing the sway bar link to the d. fork. I would give it a shot. It might be more of a bitch to put the spring and strut combo back in but hell, it may be worth it. Good Luck!

____________________________
Stock appearing 1999 RS
"Its what you don't see thats gonna beat you..."

I still don't understand how you get an allen wrench in the front of that bolt? I'm trying right now to get the strut out without disconnecting the sway bar from the d. fork, but I can't do it. There's shit for clearance down there as it is and without removing certain pieces there's even less. This is really fing pissing me off. I have a good mind to just cut that bolt in half. If I did that, would I just be able to but another bolt to throw in there or is that whole connecting piece one piece?

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I dunno, you may have to buy a new front sway bar if you hack that peice off. I don't have my car here right now or I would run out and take a look, but you may be able to disconnect the top of the dampening fork and slip the strut out that way. Not sure though. Hmmm....you could always run to a auto parts store and grab a bolt spliter and split the nut in half and get it off that way.

____________________________
Stock appearing 1999 RS
"Its what you don't see thats gonna beat you..."

I wanna drive this car into a deep river

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You don't take it off!

You just raise the other side of the car so that you can pull the suspension far enough up and than pull it out. If you don't know what I mean justr message me. It's so easy its not funny. I tried to take off the sway bar the same way and stripped it but found a new way.

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98 ESi
95 GS

here's a trick.. get another jack and put it under that part of the car and lift it up.. that will lessen the tension on the sway bar and it will not be hard to remove.

-Jason

97 Talon ESi-T (forever in progress...)


95 GS (Gone)
16.74@83.18mph
119.8 whp - 113.3 lbs/ft


2GNT #677
My Wiki Page: www.2gnt.com/index.php?d=Iamnotwhoiam
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>You don't take it off!
>
>You just raise the other side of the car so that you can
>pull the suspension far enough up and than pull it out. If
>you don't know what I mean justr message me. It's so easy
>its not funny. I tried to take off the sway bar the same way
>and stripped it but found a new way.

But you still have to get the bolt out of the dampener itself (the one that holds the strut in place). In order to get THAT out, from what I can tell, you have to take out the bolt in question. I think, if I can get ahold of a bolt cutter, I'll try and cut off the nut then remove the bolt, if that's even possible. This suspension is pissing me off so much. When I put the wheel back on after working on that part of the car and tried to drive it, I hear a NEW noise coming from that wheel. I got rid of the old one, but now I have an even more annoing noise. It sounds like a constant grinding/rubbing coming from the front pass. side wheel whenever I turn left. Aie yai yai this car is driving me nuts.

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