Today was the day we got together to install JC’s new coils. It’s been probably about 4-5 years since we last installed the original BC coils in his car and it was due for a replacement. He drives his CT daily so it takes the beating of the harsh winter too so when we took them out, they weren’t a pretty sight to see.

I’d have to say that coilovers are generally a pretty easy installation. A few bolts here and there, swap out and put new ones in, tighten and you’re done. BUT, after several years of being on the car and the combination of them being beat to hell by winter – a simple thing like a seized bolt can make an easy installation a pain in the ass. I think every corner of JC’s car proved to be a bitch today and it took us 6 hours to get ‘er done. I didn’t even get a chance to get a finished product pic because we finished so late and we were in a hurry to go out for mother’s day dinner. They weren’t fully settled anyway – so the picture wouldn’t have been a fair representation of what it would look like in a few days.

Anyway – let’s get to it!

Start of the day… 10AM – fresh faces, good attitude, ready to tackle anything.

Sitting pretty outside

Punit brought the soccer mom-mobile

Team meeting I guess…

Here was our first obstacle. The two strut bolts on the driver side were seized completely. I don’t think we’ve ever had strut bolts that were on this bad. We took multiple turns at it with breaker bars on both sides with no budging. We even sprayed it with penetrating oil several times and let it sit – still nada after all of us gave it a go.

While waiting for the fronts again and to catch our breaths, Punit and Gopesh were having some troubles of their own on the rear…

One of them being Aldo from behind…

While Gopesh and Punit were frustrated with the rear – Gopesh and Aldo took a stab at the fronts. We ended up snapping one of the breaker bars right off…

Voila. Guess what – it still didn’t break loose.

Next, we decided to go ahead and torch it. I heated it up for a few minutes and then we bring in the big guns. Punit on the right pushing down – Gopesh on the left pulling up.

Right after this shot, it ended up breaking loose. This must have been at least the 10th time we went at it full force. Finally…

A shot of the nuts off…

Meanwhile, JC and Aldo brought some refreshments. It was a beautiful day today but a frustrating one in the garage lol.

A shot of new vs old…

As I mentioned – the old ones were not in the greatest shape…

Here’s a shot of the passenger side front all in. We had similar issues on this side, but not nearly to the same degree of difficulty as the drivers side.

The rears caused issues as one of the endlinks that JC wanted to replace was seized up. The bolt also ended up getting stripped as well. The only way to get it off at this point was to cut it off. Easy right?

A shot of the rear

Just some of the weapons used today…

The rear spring out. Same condition as the fronts.

New vs old rear struts

Hovercraft CT

It was somewhere around this point that we realized cutting that bolt off wasn’t so easy. All of us took a go at it and we spent nearly 3 hours trying to get it cut off.

Dat ass doe… Shameless plug.

Another shot of us trying to cut it off…

Finally after cutting it from two sides, we were able to stick the end of the hammer in and pry it off. What a bitch.

One of four blades we went through to cut it off.

My last shot is a happy one. All the new equipment in and ready to go. I’ll try and get some new shots of JC’s stance after vacation – but I’m happy to say that despite all the difficulty we had today, we still finished. Nice teamwork from everyone today!