Nice job! These are the springs I have been looking at as well. Let us know how it goes!

Any pics??

 

Well done Goob.

Mine only took a bit over an hour. It helps when it is on a hoist and have impact gun. And a Mechanic. Only $96 too. I took the cowling and wipers out before gong to garage. It was easy.

 

They are. for one thing, I seem to slip a lot less on take offs. I tried taking the 294 highway to see if the section of bumps still made the car feel unstable. But because I entered the highway much further north than I normally would (to go south), I found a section that felt ridiculously smooth. It was weird. But I did end up driving partly over the section that I complained about before... felt a bit more stable, though I didn't take the whole route and possibly exited before it got worse. I dunno... that will have to wait for another day.

I did start taking pictures... I took a before shot, but the problem was, I could only take the picture I wanted outside (much more room), but it was way too cold to work on it outside, so I had to back the car into the garage to do the rears. Once I finished the rears, I pulled the car out to take an "after" shot (even though it was only the rear). I moved the car to the wrong position for the shot. Then I adjusted the position and took another shot.

I wanted to compare the shots more directly without the bad position shot in-between, so I went to delete it.... I ended up deleting the before shot.

At which point, I just gave up on the pictures.

My idea was the get the car in the exact position for before and after shots, then I could put the pictures up (in car domain). When you load the page, you would get see the picture of the car before the change, then, when you put your mouse over it, it would flip to the picture of it after the change. And if positioned correctly, you could then see the wheels in the same spot and only the body height changed.

If it had been warm, I would've done the whole thing outside, then I would have a series of pictures made into a little GIF image... showing the car in various states of the swap.

I doubt I could do the whole thing in an hour (or even two)... I'm kinda slow when it comes to working on the car. The rears could've been pretty quick, but I had to keep adjusting the height of the car on the floor jacks. Initially, I raised it enough to get the back wheels off the ground, but found out it wasn't enough to release the springs... so I had to lift it some more and then adjust the jack stands to match (either that, or take off both wheels ).

As for the front... OH MY F-ING GOD, not taking off the cowl was a bad idea. Probably could've shaved off an hour (if not more) because of it.

Granted, I was going slow because its the first time I've done the front of any vehicle (changed the rear dampers on Pathfinder). but that cowl! I think I broke some bits too.

I did the passenger side first, and when I was putting it back in, I forgot the HUGE rubber piece that goes on top of the strut tower before putting it back onto the car... needless to say, one (blue) clip broke, one (black) pin went flying, and some edges of the cowl are bent from the impact of the ratchet on it's underside. I didn't have that problem on the driver side, since, like I said, I couldn't use my ratchet there... @.@

I did manage to go without a spring compressor. I used some bungle cords to make sure the spring and strut didn't send each other flying. I put the end against various objects so the nut didn't go flying (too far) when it came off.

I have to go back and pull the dust cover (?) back down on the passenger side, and maybe also the driver side. When I put it back together, I forgot to do it on the passenger side, and barely did it on the driver side (didn't seem like it would stay).

I must be crazy/stupid to have done this yesterday... when it was all done, my hands were BRIGHT RED from the cold. The outside air was officially below freezing... and the garage wasn't much better since I couldn't close the door (had to leave the car sticking out of the garage).

 

Your getting hard corps man... Be careful in San Diego or they will want to give you room and board at the MCRD.... After you have chunked it into some fast curves you will suddenly realize how inadequate the stock wheels and tires are... It amazes me that they could make the springs work so well with the stock struts and shocks.... I swore I would never put lowering springs on a car again after my experience with Eibachs..... Cars do look good dropped way down in the weeds but it sure screws them up something terrible... Thankfully that isn't what Swift does.

 

No army in the world would want me! I'm too lazy. It'd be too much work and too little return in my case.

But, even so, they still wouldn't want me, I'm completely deaf in my left ear. Makes it impossible for me to know where a sound is coming from. every time someone calls out to me, i look around like a (lost) idiot trying to figure out where the person is. Can you imagine trying to figure who/where the shot came from?!?

You know how, in the movies, they always talk about where a shot came from? They always know, nearly instantly where the shooter is. I'd be... "huh? this way? hum? that way? uh..."

moving on

Yeah, every time I take a corner I keep worrying that my tires are gonna give out and send me sliding off into a ditch.

ps... I miss SD... maybe I'll move back there someday. Of course, it'll probably be right before the town gets smacked by a tsunami, with my luck. =.='

Its not supposed to be able to happen, since there's a barrier reef a bit out... but hey, if Atlanta can get freezing snow and icy roads... while Chicago is dry as a bone, anything can happen.

 

So you had fun. Hey at least you did not drop an axle or would have been a long night.

I broke on clip on the center cowling piece.

Not to worry about the pics. It will look like all the others.

A good do it yourself and pics here

https://www.fitfreak.net/forums/2nd-...r-ge8-fit.html

 

I was completely paranoid about dropping the axle too, after reading about it (bungle cords!)... i barely finished in time to get to work... if I had dropped it... i would've been totally screwed.

yeah, i saw that diy, that's when I decided to try to do it without removing the cowl. >.>

 

i offered someone on ebay $200 for some brand new swifts, lets hope he accepts

 

Ken, let me know if he bites. I may offer the same.

 

he has 10 of em available, buy it now is at 244.. kinda lowballing but lets see what happens

i'll let you know!

 

As our Asian Fit brothers might say... NO NEEEEED!!! Taking the cowl off isn't necessary. All you need is a metric box end or combo ratchet wrench. They are a wonderful thing to have, and a HUGE time & knuckle skin saver.

4 Piece Ratcheting Box End Set, Metric


6 Piece Metric Color Combo Wrench Set

 

After getting the wheel and everything on the underside off (leaving only the top tower bolt holding the strut in) I debated putting it back together and running to sears to buy one of those! But my (irrational) laziness won out, and I just kept going at it.

Kenmei... at $244, I'd rather just buy from www.evasivemotorsports.com costs $254 (option for free shipping too). But, I'm biased.... I hate eBay.

 

My Swifts are here, and I will probably just install them this weekend if I get over this cold, but I was curious about getting torque specs right with those style of wrenches, which buying one of might be a good investment. I suspect the gutentighten method is the most commonly used, but I like to stick to the specs.

 

The following has been edited now that Goobers has made it clear that my memory has failed me. AGAIN.

Tight is the key. I wouldn't be concerned with the torque for a couple of reasons. First, unless you take the cowl off, it's almost impossible to get an allen wrench in the top of the strut shaft, let alone an allen wrench that's long enough to reach and with a shallow "L" where you could slip it into the top of the strut shaft with the cowling on. Fortunately, I have some long metric allen wrenches. Second, you would need to use a crowfoot flarenut like this on the end of your torque wrench, which still might not offer enough clearance without taking off the cowl:

Passenger Side cowl access - just enough room with the right tools


Driver Side cowl access - you NEED the right tools - forget the torque wrench


This is where Goobers "sniffed out" my brain fart (now corrected):

Using the diagram below... Everything inside the black square/rectangle box is installed on the strut assy (duh - why I overlooked that and went by memory is beyond me). The bearing, part #12 seats against the lower machined edge of the strut shaft (solid red arrow line). The retaining nut part #20 screws down on top of that bearing (dashed red arrow line), and can be torqued to spec since you will have it in your hands. It all ends up looking like the picture I already had in my album but didn't use - double DUH!!! The conical shaped part #13 (green dotted ellipse) slides on top of nut #20, and that complete strut/spring assy (solid green arrow line) goes up through the cup at the top of the wheel well.

Once you slide the strut/spring assy up into the wheel well cup, getting parts #14, 19 and 18 (solid blue rectangle) onto the shaft threads can be challenging without an extra set of hands. Slide parts #14 and 19 onto the shaft, and tighten down nut #18. Once the assy is all snug up in the cup and hanging against part #14, grab the whole assy from below and try to move it around a bit to make sure its seated properly. Try to tighten nut #18 again. You should see quite a few exposed threads above nut #18 if the assy is seated correctly, at least enough where the rubber cap #3 would stay on the strut shaft. Now it's time to get the car back on the ground.

The weight of the vehicle pushes down on part #13 once off the jack/stand. So you REALLY need to be concerned that the nut #18 is fully tightened down against the washer #19. Once the strut assy is bearing the full load, attempt tighten down that nut again. That should be it. Drive the car for a couple of days, then try to tighten the nut #18 again bearing the weight of the car. You should have no issues whatsoever.



Assembled w/o conical cap


Thanks Goobers!

 

Excellent tip. Thanks man!

 

oh crap... i read jim2bfit's comment last night and meant to check the bolts on top of the struts today, but forgot... well, maybe i'll just bring the wrench with me and do it after i get out of work.

on another note... i've been trying to see how differently I can push my Fit last few days... it's very strange (in a good way)... taking the entrance ramps to highways (heck even some coming off the highway) are giving me nice smooth rides and zippy!

Although at one point, it felt like I was over AND understeering at the same time! OOps, pushed a little too hard.

I like it.

Gotta find me some "twisties"!

 

Sounds like some controllable lift off oversteer with throttle modulation; something a performance fwd car depends on to do it's thing well.

 

i offered him $200 (lowball lol) but no reply after the 2days were up! i'm going to try again on monday...if not i think i'll (try to) hold off for used ones..

 

sounds more like something I shouldn't attempt to repeat, unless I want to end ass up in a ditch.

mad skillz, not so sure I gots.

I'm not a big fan of buying used stuff either. But, if that's your thing... that's cool. For me, $254 for a set of new springs is acceptable.

 

excuse the double post.

Well, yesterday... every chance I got, I stared at my car, trying to "soak" in it's looks. Basically, what a lot of people do when they have a new toy.

After installing the springs, I really like the handling. And originally, I was starting to like the look of the car after being lowered.

But, now I have a problem. The fact its lowered, I kinda like... it gives the car an overall more aggressive "pose." If nothing else, its an interesting look. The problem is the wheel well.

You see... I learned a long time ago, my sense of "aesthetics" actually goes hand in hand with mathematics. What does that mean? I like when things are proportional and have some symmetry.

When it was stock and you looked at the wheel well, there was a huge gap between the fender and the tire itself.... but, despite that, it was relatively consistent in the gap from front, to the top and back.

Now that the car is lowered, the top of the tire is closer to the fender, but not the front or back. That makes it look out of proportion. It makes it look like it NEEDS bigger (diameter) tires. But as you know, putting bigger tires (now) wouldn't actually change the proportion look. A fix would be to raise the car back up (back to stock springs)... but that would give up the handling.

The only solution I can think of, to keep the handling and "fix" the look... to cut and re-mold the area around the wheel. Of course, that's one costly and intensive job I'm not about to deal with.

oh, btw... jim2bfit... there's a slight problem with the picture of the strut parts and red lines. the two lines should be pointing at part #12 and #20. parts #13, #14, #19 and #18 all sit on top of #12 (bearing), which is held down by #20... a nut that goes on the same threads that part #18 goes onto.

there is no bearing in #14... only #12 is the bearing... the inner shaft of the damper doesn't rotate when the car turns. It's stationary relative to the car. the part #12 allows everything below it to rotate. And to do that, no part of #12 actually rests on the shaft. the lower half rests on part #10 (being pushed into it by the spring), the upper half pushes into part #13. It is initially held down by the the part #20 (nut), but once you put the car on the ground, part #13 puts more force onto the bearing.

ultimately, what we want is part #12 and #18 to tighten against each other (with everything in between).

for anyone that isn't sure why... take a bolt and grab two nuts (matching diameter, thread count, etc). put the first nut anywhere on the bolt where it's still "loose." Put the second nut right up to the first nut and tighten them to each other. notice that neither will move now.