To the members out there that have changed your front struts, could you tell me the procedure and sequence you followed. It appears that you have to disconnect the front sway bar link then the lower ball joint, then the upper 3 bolts and finally the lower strut bolt. I also want to make sure that the strut and spring come out in one piece, true strut fashion, or is it a coil over where the spring is seperate when it comes out? I have a spring compressor but it looks like the hooks might be too small for the spring, so what brand or size compressor did you use? Thank you in advance for any info!

 

I installed the Daystar spacers and had to remove the struts to do that, here's the directions I followed.

Jack up truck, take off wheels.
2. Loosen top strut nuts
3. Remove steering link
4. Remove bottom strut bolt
5. Remove uppper ball joint (be careful, A-arm will fall when you do this)
6. Take out strut assembly and compress coil spring
7. Dismantle strut assembly, and remove coil spring isolator

You might not have to remove the sway bar link if you are just replacing the struts with new one the same height, if you go taller you'll need to.

Good Luck
Marty

 

One thing I forgot, the springs are pretty heavy duty, I used a wall mounted spring compressor to compress the springs, not one of the compressor sets you can buy or rent at an auto parts store. When you reassemble make sure you get the top strut nut tight, if you don't you'll hear a rattle when you hit a bump after you reinstall. I did a final tighten after the struts were reinstalled and the truck was off jacks.

Marty

 

I first tried with a spring compressor I rented from an auto store and wouldnt work. I ended up taking in into work and doing in on the wall mounted unit just like MadMarty. It was rather easy