I'm shopping around for replacement struts and I think I've settled on OEM Honda ones simply because they're pre-assembled (don't want to bother with spring compressor).


Has anyone bought OEM Honda struts from the dealership and just dropped them right in? There was nothing that needed to be done with them? I asked the dealership I buy my parts at and they said it is pre-assembled but I'm looking for people who actually went this route.


Also the service manual says you loosely bolt the components on and then you load the suspension with the weight of the vehicle using a floor jack (the rest of the front is on jack stands). Has anyone done this? How did you do this? Jack it up under the rotor (sounds too fragile)? Jack it up under the lower control arm just a bit behind the ball joint?


How did you know when to stop jacking it up? Someone said when the car just slightly comes off the jack stand on that side. Yay or nay?

 

The parts you want to tighten when the suspension is under load are bolts going through bushings. That would be the bolts going through the upper and lower control arms.

The way I load the suspension is use a jack on the lower control arm just behind the ball joint. When the car just lifts off the jack stand is when you know it is under full load.

 

If you don't feel comfortable with the jacking method, another way to do it is to drive the car up on ramps, or up over a curb one wheel at a time.

In either case the key is to have the suspension at regular ride height when you tighten those bushings.

Fyi you can drive the car off/on ramps with the bolts slightly loose. Just take it slow as the suspenion will clunk around a bit with the slight amount of play. And if that scares you, then go ahead and tighten the bolts before you move the car, but when it's in it's final torquing position, loosen each bolt to let the bushing relax to it's normal position and then retighten it.

 

Yay, this method is just fine.

On the arm on the ball joint is fine. You don't have to lift the whole car. You just need to compress the spring enough to get it in and out.

And if you want a little cheaper price on OEM parts



HTH

 

So I have to confess this is for a Civic. On the Civic the strut replacement seems dead easy, there are no bushings I have to mess with that I can see. Maybe on the Accord it's different?

So on my Civic I only have literally the two flange bolts connecting the steering knuckle to the strut and then the ABS sensor bracket bolt and the brake line clip. Up top it's the three nuts holding the strut mount onto the body. Once all of this is disconnected the strut can pull right out.

So based on the service manual there's no messing with anything on the lower control arm like the compliance bushing or the shock bushing (the one that looks kind of like a lemon.

Because of this I never really understood why the service manual tells you to load the suspension. I always understood loading the suspension as you do that so the bolts for bushings are tightened when the suspension is at final ride height and load. But I'm assuming the service manual knows better than me. Maybe it's because tightening the two bolts and the three nuts on top under load prevents wear on the bushings on the LCA simply because the strut is connected to the knuckle which is connected to the LCA? Who knows...

Also I know the two flange bolts that go through the steering knuckle can be replaced with camber bolts from Honda (they have them in the diagram) and that makes me think the camber alignment can be mucked around with through this. People say you don't need an alignment, the camber bolts and other people say to me that you do. You guys think I need an alignment versus should I get one? Not getting one is probably going to change my tire wear or something right? Not like it's going to pull me into the shoulder and make me crash?

 

Sounds like you don't have the bushing orientation issue.

On our Toyota Sienna the struts need to be loaded in order to hold the shaft tight when the top nut is tightened. The top shaft doesn't have a hex hole in it, so those struts must have an internal mechanism that holds the shaft from rotating when it is compressed. But that's Toyota, and you are purchasing a pre-assembled unit anyway, so not your issue.

Regarding alignment, IMHO if the suspension hasn't been whacked and bent out of alignment and you are not seeing abnormal tire wear, then I would think caster and camber can be left along. Toe-in is then the only thing you will need to check after you replace the struts. There are ways to do this yourself, or you can bring it in to a shop.