How to Install Coilovers in Your Car

hey guys Chris fix here and today I'm going to show you how to install coilovers in your car or truck in this case we'll be installing front coilovers which are these right here and rear coilovers which are these right here as well as our camber caster plates so that we could adjust our camber and Caster alignment in our car and I'm going to show you everything that you need to know so after watching this video you'll be able to install coilovers in your very own vehicle using common hand tools but first what are coilovers and what's the benefit to installing them a coilover is exactly how it sounds it's a coil spring that sits over a shock the coil spring is what supports the weight of the vehicle and the shock controls the motion of the spring and the car's weight transfer on my car we're going to be removing the spring which is right here and the shock in the form of a strut which is right here and we'll be replacing both of those with our coilover now the main benefit of running coilovers is all the adjustability these give view for example ride height adjustability you turn these nuts right here and we could change the ride height on our car so we could go from this monster truck Mustang to this the Sleek lowered sports car and not only will lowering the car a couple of inches make it look so much better but lowering the car is also going to lower the center of gravity so the car is more stable going around turns another benefit of coilovers is that you could customize the spring rate for your application whether you're drifting your drag racing you're autocrossing or you're driving on the street and you just want something a little more sporty and spring rate is the amount of weight or force it takes to compress the spring a given distance so if you're using 250 lb in Springs that means it takes 250 lb to compress that spring 1 in and if you wanted to compress the spring another inch it takes another 250 lb and the good thing about these Springs is they're really easy to switch out all you have to do is change the springs on your coilovers and the final benefit could be found on higher end coilovers and that's the ability to adjust damping so for our front coilovers we have double adjustable damping and for our rear coilovers we have single adjustable damping so up front we're going to be able to adjust the compression and the rebound of our shock all we have to do to adjust the compression if we want to make it stiffer we just turn the knob to the plus Direction and then now the shock's harder to compress and rebound is the exact opposite so we could turn this to make the rebound stiffer so it's harder to move back out so all these adjustments on coilovers is really what's going to allow us to D in this car and get it the way we want it so we're going to be able to lower the car lower the center of gravity we're going to be able to run stiffer springs for Less body roll and we're going to be able to adjust the damping of the suspension so all of that sounds awesome now let me show you how to install coilovers and before we Jack the car up and take the wheels off you want to try to find a place on the driveway that's relatively flat and what we're going to do is we're going to take a ride height measurement on all four corners and you want to measure Each corner of the car the same way so I'm measuring it through the center of the wheel to the bottom of the fender and this is 28 in so I went and measured all four corners of the car and we'll reference these numbers later on when we lower the car now let's get the car jacked up in the air so we're going to jack up the front end place our jack stands underneath the car and rest the frame of the car on the jack stands as always anytime you lift up the vehicle it's a good idea to give it a nice strong shake to make sure it feels solid and doesn't move and it's always a good idea to chalk off your rear wheels and for even more safety I like putting the wheel under the frame of the car and now we have access to our suspension so what we're going to do is we're going to remove the brakes and then we're going to loosen up our sway bar end link so that we could drop the suspension down which will allow us to remove this coil spring and the strut so that we can replace it with our coil over we're also going to be installing the camber caster plate which could be found in the engine bay right at the top of the strut Tower but first let's focus on dropping the suspension so we're going to start with removing the brakes and to do that we need to get to the caliper bolt behind the caliper so let's work with the car and turn the steering wheel to get to the two caliper bolts right back here so let's go and remove those bolts they're 15 mm yeah right that's not going to happen we're going to have to use a breaker bar but that's okay cuz our breaker bar makes easy work breaking loose the top bolt and the bottom bolt now we can get our ratchet and loosen up these bolts that's the top bolt and that's the bottom next grab a bucket or something that you could use to support the calper just like that and then remove the brake rotor and the whole point of removing the caliper from the suspension is so when we drop the suspension down we're not pulling on the brake line which will damage it we also want to make sure that we take off the top bolt here on the sway bar end link which is also preventing our suspension from dropping down this is a 15 mm nut so loosen it up good and remove the bushing as well and with that sway bar inlink nut remov the only thing holding our suspension up is this strut right here and you want to be very careful cuz this spring is under tremendous Force it's forcing the control arm downwards and this strut here is holding it up so if we just remove these two Bolts from the strut this control arm could go flying downwards and the spring could come flying out and that's a dangerous situation so what we're going to do is we're going to grab our Jack and slide it under the control arm and jack up the control arm just a little bit to support the suspension so with our Jack holding the control arm up putting pressure against that coil spring we could safely remove the two bolts holding in the strut so grab a wrench and a 24 mm socket and loosen up the top bolt and this bolt isn't budging so screw the nut back on the tip of the bolt so we could tap it with a hammer perfect now let's do the same thing for the bottom bolt unscrew it almost all the way and pop it out with a hammer just a little wiggle and it's out now we could separate the strut and the knuckle good and with the strut and knuckle separated the only thing holding in the strut is that bolt right there at the strut Tower and this bolt could be somewhat tricky you can't just put a wrench on here and turn it because you could see the strut shaft also turns so what you have to do is you have to get a wrench and then a flathead screwdriver in that slot and turn it and this is coming off surprisingly easy but if it doesn't you could always use a little bit of penetrating fluid to help loosen it up and once the nut is pretty loose you're going to want to grab onto the strut cuz it's going to just drop once this nut comes off and with the strut removed we're not done yet we need something from this strut so take the dust cover off there it is we have a bump stop which is a good idea to put on our coilover this acts as a cushion if the coilover is compressed all the way so with our coilover ready to go next let's install the camber caster plate this will allow us to adjust the caster which is back and forth and the camber which is side to side since we're going to be lowering the car that's going to affect our alignment and we're going to have to adjust the camber so it's important that you run a camber caster plate if you don't have an adjustable strut mount so now we could remove the stock strut mount there's three bolts holding it in and then two rivets back here that we have to drill out so first let's remove the three bolts that's one two and three and that's the bottom part of the plate and look here this is interesting looks like somebody forgot to finish this rivet from the factory so now we only have one rivet we need to remove and it's that one right there and what we're going to do is drill it out while you drill if the rivet just spins and you're not getting anywhere turn the drill a little so you drill at an angle and break the rivet and there we go the top plate is removed now knock the rest of the rivet out of the hole good and don't forget to clean the area with some soapy water so the new camber caster plate could sit flat on the strut Tower surface and don't worry I'll be doing an engine bay cleaning video very soon now the camer Caster plate installation is pretty simple you separate it like that and the bottom piece goes under the strut Tower and the top piece sits on top of that the only problem we have is there's four studs here but only three holes here so we're going to have to drill another hole right about here but we can't do it about there we have to find exactly where it's going to be so what we're going to do is we're going to paint the top of the bolt get a nice thick layer of paint on there there and then flip the plate over and now there are slots here so we're going to make our first Mark at one side of the slot and then slide it to the other side and make another Mark and that worked awesome we have a mark there and a mark there for this slot now I'm going to use the middle of those two marks and use a center punch to make a dimple for our drill bit next we're going to drill our hole out so add some oil to the bit for some lubrication I'm starting with a smaller bit to drill a pilot hole then you can move to your fulls size bit and these Cobalt bits cut through that hardened steel like a hot knife through butter and anytime you drill or cut metal you want to get a little touch-up paint around the edges and inside so it doesn't rust now let's install the bottom plate and see how we did beautiful that fits perfect so add a washer to each stud then add the top plate and hand tighten the four nuts to hold it together and that's how you install camber caster plates it's very simple to do we're using the nice four bolt design instead of the stock three bolt Design This is a lot more sturdy and this is going to give us a lot of alignment adjustability for when we lower the the car with our coilovers so now what we're going to be doing is we need to remove the coil spring here that's the last thing we need to do before we could install the coil over and remember this is under tremendous amount of pressure here so we don't want to just drop the Jack and then that comes flying out cuz that could be dangerous we're going to slowly let the Jack down and depressurize this coil spring and we don't want to stand right in front of the spring either move off to the side so that the car is protecting your body and you're not directly in line with the spring just in case it does come flying out it shouldn't if we do this slowly so slowly let that control arm down and once it's down all the way you might need to use a pry bar to help you remove the spring the rest of the way and with the spring removed we could install the coil over now this is easy get the coil over and you're going to push the top up through the camber caster plate like that and be sure to have the washer and nut ready and once the nuts on the coilover is held in place so you could just let go now we could Bolt the coil over into the knuckle so jack up the control arm to raise the knuckle up so it's even with the coil over and then line them up and shimmy them together so they fit then get that top bolt in and the bottom bolt and then add the Top Nut and bottom nut and with those two bolts in now we're going to grab our medium strength thread locker and right where the nut is going to tighten up against the coil over add some thread Locker on the top bolt and on the bottom bolt and we're using medium strength thread Locker cuz this is a high vibration area being that it's the suspension so this is going to prevent any vibrations from loosening up those bolts now we want to tighten Tien these bolts to 150 ftlb of torque that's one and that's the other and with the two coil over to knuckle bolts torqued down now we could go and tighten up the sway bar end link so we'll add our bushing and the nut and this nut supposed to be torqued down to around 14 ft-lbs or just enough so that it's snug and compressing the bushing good and with that tightened down let's go to the top up here and get our camber caster plates adjusted and tightened down now as the name implies we could adjust our caster which is in this direction and looks like this you could see the coilover moving forwards and backwards and we could adjust our camber which is in this direction and that tilts the wheel let me show you that with the wheel on so the top of the wheel could move inwards which is negative camber or outwards which is positive camber and for now I'm just going to be eyeballing this alignment I'm not going to get it perfect I'm going to take this car in for a laser alignment I want to try to get this side to match with the other side which by the way is identical so everything we're doing on this side putting the coil over in all that stuff is going to be the exact same process on the other side so what I'm going to do here is I'm going to try to get this Caster right in the middle which is right about there and these bolts should be tightened down to 40t LBS but I'm just going to Snug them up for now because I really don't know if this alignment for the Caster is going to be good or not so for now just get these four bolts snugged up so you could drive it to the alignment shop so now that our Caster is adjusted it won't move back and forth we could adjust our camber and since this is a drift car I'm going to put the camera all the way to the negative settings for now we'll see how that looks snug that up good now our caster and our camber is set now let's tighten down the coilover bolt for this we get a wrench over the nut and a little wrench on the top of the stud and we just tighten it down since we need to have this little wrench on the top we can't torque it down so I'm just going to tighten it so it's nice and tight just like that it's always a good idea to get your paint marker and mark the bolt and the stud so now if this bolt loosens up you'll see because this straight line here won't be aligned anymore all right with a caster and Camber plate nuts tightened down as well as the coilover nut we are so close to finishing this front coilover all we have to do now is get the brakes in and then we can lower the car down and see how it looks so let's finish this up we're going to put the brake rotor on and then slide the caliper over the rotor now hand tighten the top bolt and the bottom bolt and then torque both bolts down to 95 ftlb good and before we put the wheel back on and lower the car let's adjust our damping so we have compression and rebound there's 18 clicks of adjustment on each knob it was suggested to me that we run three clicks up of compression and halfway or nine clicks up of rebound and then you could go for your test drive and see if you need to adjust these next let's lower the Jack and move it out of the way and with the suspension unloaded there's one more thing that we need to do and that is adjust our ride height and tighten these jam nuts now I say with the suspension unloaded because you want to have the tires off the ground when you're adjusting the ride height so there's no pressure on this spring and you can see here there's two nuts there's one up here this is the spring seat nut if you turn this in One Direction you can see we're raising the height of the vehicle so we could raise the height all the way up to the top threads right up here and then if we turn this in the other direction you could see that we're lowering the height of the vehicle and then let's just say you want the ride height setting to be right there this bottom nut is the jam nut and what you do is you just tighten this up against the spring seat nut that we were just adjusting and then that locks it in place you want the ride height on this coil over to match the ride height on the other coil over so your front end sits level and to make that easy what I'm going to do is I'm going to set this to the lowest ride height setting on both sides once we get to the lowest setting you want to turn these nuts into each other and these coilovers come with wrenches to help you grab onto these nuts so you can get more leverage and lock them into place now the ride height is locked in and we are done and that is how you install coilovers really not difficult you could easily do it at home now I cannot wait to see how this car looks when we lower it down to the ground but before we put the wheels on I want to mention something make sure you buy some quality coil s this is a main part of your suspension this is acting like your strut and your spring together and kind of like an upper control arm so not only is the quality important for how the car handles and feels but it's also important for safety all right with the front coilovers installed let's put the wheels on remove the jack stands and slowly drop her down I cannot wait to see how this car looks oh man and there's our first problem so already we're dealing with problems that you get with lowered cars just like our Jack which is definitely hitting the frame at the front here and it's definitely not going to clear I'm never going to be able to pull this out so we're going to have to Jack this up slightly and get a couple of pieces of wood underneath the front tires and then let the car down again and that gives us enough clearance to pull the Jack out and holy smokes you guys said you wanted to see the drift staying lowered well check that out that looks awesome it looks so good not only does it look good I can't wait to see how it's going to function on the track and on the road so let's see how much we dropped it so I got a tape measure and we'll measure the same same exact way we did before and we're at 25 1/2 in and the suspension isn't even settled before we are at 28 in so we drop 2 and 1/2 in and another thing we want to look at is our camber and I'm going to take this car to get aligned but for now you can see I have a lot of negative camber which is perfect for the track if you're driving this on the street you don't want to put too much negative camber you'll eat up your tires but because the top of our tire is tucked in a little bit that way it's a good idea to get your hand back in here and just make sure that you have clearance between the coilover and the wheel and we have plenty of room here so there you go I couldn't have asked for a better install on the front coilovers that looks awesome I can't wait to try it out on the track but we're not done yet we still have to do the rear coilovers and because that's totally different since we have a solid rear axle compared to an independent suspension in the front I'm going to do another video on that it's going to be filled with even more information and I'm going to show you the car dropped completely down the way it's going to sit I'm going to get it aligned and we're going to go for a test drive so as always I hope the video was helpful if it was remember to give it a thumbs up stay tuned for that next video all the products I use in this video coilovers camber caster plates and tools are linked in the description if you're not a subscriber consider subscribing and the next video will be linked right on the side there just click on the screen over on the right or find the link in the description below

Channel: ChrisFix

Views: 4,331,902

Keywords: How to install coilovers, coilovers, shocks, struts, suspension, coilover installation, how to lower your car, lowering springs, camber adjustment, camber caster plates, camber plate installation, benefits of coilovers, 15 minute coilovers, coilover install, spring rate, adjustable coilovers

Id: 8Qou-MDcYKA

Length: 16min 45sec (1005 seconds)

Published: Thu May 25 2017