How my bilstein swap went to crap...

[Fletch125]

Ordered some bil 5100s two weeks ago along with new uca's. $320 out the door with everything. I run a super tight schedule between work and finishing my BA, but I had Monday morning off (work midnights) and decided to get after it. The idiot before me installed spacers. I had to used a spring compressor just to get the struts out. Right UCA was toast thanks to the spacers. Got it all tore apart and was ready to disassemble the stock struts. Everything went to hell at this point. The spacers acted like a retaining pond and collect 3 years worth of water. The nuts were so rusted they didn't even have a hex head anymore! Tried absolutely everything. All my tools are at work so I was working with zero air power. Finally said F it and ordered new struts from Amazon, figuring I'd rob the parts and put it on the bils. (At this point I was willing to pay the $220). Well some how my expedited order didn't process in time so next day air was a no go.

Had 6 hours left before work and called every ram dealer hoping they'd have the mounts and springs....nope. A NAPA down the road happened to have a pair that a guy ordered and never picked up....thank God.

Problem #769 today: the quick struts are completely different that stock. No way the bils were going to work. I finally just said F it and installed the stock ones. All done within 30 mins....at the cost of $400. Unfortunately I had to be to work and didn't have a choice. 10 hours of crap and several hundred dollars later, I went from 38.75" fender to ground, to 38.25" fender to ground [emoji45][emoji45]

Alignment appointment in the morning. I miss my leveled look but it wasn't happening. Now since I used one of the Uca's from the kit, I can't return it. So my plan is to torch the nuts off at work and reassemble the bils on a bench. Wont reinstall until spring when it's warm and my wallet has recouped.

Real bummer but welcome to the rust belt. Literally spent 3 hours with a cold chisel trying to beat the nuts off.

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[Fletch125]

UCA

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[GsRAM]

Man, that stinks. Sorry you had all that trouble. . I feel your pain though. I have similar issues when i start big jobs. Almost always stuff comes up that makes the job take twice as long as i figured it would. Glad you got it back together for work though.

 

[JB1]

Sorry to hear that fletch

 

[lharrell79]

Ordered some bil 5100s two weeks ago along with new uca's. $320 out the door with everything. I run a super tight schedule between work and finishing my BA, but I had Monday morning off (work midnights) and decided to get after it. The idiot before me installed spacers. I had to used a spring compressor just to get the struts out. Right UCA was toast thanks to the spacers. Got it all tore apart and was ready to disassemble the stock struts. Everything went to hell at this point. The spacers acted like a retaining pond and collect 3 years worth of water. The nuts were so rusted they didn't even have a hex head anymore! Tried absolutely everything. All my tools are at work so I was working with zero air power. Finally said F it and ordered new struts from Amazon, figuring I'd rob the parts and put it on the bils. (At this point I was willing to pay the $220). Well some how my expedited order didn't process in time so next day air was a no go.

Had 6 hours left before work and called every ram dealer hoping they'd have the mounts and springs....nope. A NAPA down the road happened to have a pair that a guy ordered and never picked up....thank God.

Problem #769 today: the quick struts are completely different that stock. No way the bils were going to work. I finally just said F it and installed the stock ones. All done within 30 mins....at the cost of $400. Unfortunately I had to be to work and didn't have a choice. 10 hours of crap and several hundred dollars later, I went from 38.75" fender to ground, to 38.25" fender to ground [emoji45][emoji45]

Alignment appointment in the morning. I miss my leveled look but it wasn't happening. Now since I used one of the Uca's from the kit, I can't return it. So my plan is to torch the nuts off at work and reassemble the bils on a bench. Wont reinstall until spring when it's warm and my wallet has recouped.

Real bummer but welcome to the rust belt. Literally spent 3 hours with a cold chisel trying to beat the nuts off.

Sent from my SM-N920V using Tapatalk

 

[damaltor]

I feel your pain...

Went to install the 5100's on my '07 a few years back. I don't have a garage, it's a couple days before Christmas, I've got a day off and it's not too cold out, so I decide to do the work in my driveway. All went well, got the strut out, took it into a heated shed I had to make the swap. Took my air impact wrench to remove the shock nut, after spraying it liberally with penetrating oil. No go, hammered that nut for 2 hours, used half a can of penetrating oil, tried holding the shock shaft with 2 heavy duty vice grips, tried heating it with a torch, everything I could think of, that nut was not coming loose! Gave up. as it was going to be dark in a couple hours and I'm working outside, so I put the strut back in, buttoned everything back up and admitted defeat.

So the next day, the wife and I are driving to a relatives house for a Christmas visit and every time we hit a bit of a bump, there's a loud metallic sound coming from the front end. Turns out I did loosen the nut a little and now the shaft is banging up and down in the mounting cup. GREAT!

So now I've got no choice, I've got to get it done and of course the weather has turned cold. For the next couple days, I would go out every chance I got and spray the nut and whole mounting area with penetrating oil, bought another pair of vise grips. Now it's time to attack this demon again, of course now it is well below zero, but put on all my woolies and went at it. This time I clamped on 3 vise grips, blasted that nut with another half a can of penetrating oil, heated the sucker up, cranked the pressure on my impact as high as it will go. Hammered that nut to loosen it, it would move a bit, hammered it back tight, hammered it off, hammered it tight, worked at it like this for about an hour and finally it spun off. Success, now I've still got to do the other side??!!

Now I've got a new '17, we just picked up a couple months ago and I want to put the 5100's on it????

 

[Stefan N]

Working on old cars a Heat Induction Tool is a must have

First YT hit https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2A8no15Ep0

 

[Jarhead57]

I feel your pain...

Went to install the 5100's on my '07 a few years back. I don't have a garage, it's a couple days before Christmas, I've got a day off and it's not too cold out, so I decide to do the work in my driveway. All went well, got the strut out, took it into a heated shed I had to make the swap. Took my air impact wrench to remove the shock nut, after spraying it liberally with penetrating oil. No go, hammered that nut for 2 hours, used half a can of penetrating oil, tried holding the shock shaft with 2 heavy duty vice grips, tried heating it with a torch, everything I could think of, that nut was not coming loose! Gave up. as it was going to be dark in a couple hours and I'm working outside, so I put the strut back in, buttoned everything back up and admitted defeat.

This is exactly why I don't do that stuff anymore At my age I've done enough crawling around under cars and trucks. I'd rather sit back, drink a beer (or coffee depending on weather) and have it done.

 

[damaltor]

This is exactly why I don't do that stuff anymore At my age I've done enough crawling around under cars and trucks. I'd rather sit back, drink a beer (or coffee depending on weather) and have it done.

Yeah I agree, it was back in my 50's, now in my 60's, I'm thinking, I too will sit back and have it done.
But it's a new truck, so that nut surely couldn't have rusted to bad yet and should be fairly easy this time... YEAH RIGHT!

 

[Stefan N]

Yeah I agree, it was back in my 50's, now in my 60's, I'm thinking, I too will sit back and have it done.
But it's a new truck, so that nut surely couldn't have rusted to bad yet and should be fairly easy this time... YEAH RIGHT!

I have a bad body too and I use a car lift, soo much nicer