canyoncarver

I put new shocks and o2's on a guys Z this past weekend. I started out figuring it'd be a 4 hour job. Then I could get off to that Z BBQ in Oxnard, CA.

Things started off bad. Once we got the car jacked up and started taking off the lugnuts, the impact wrench starts going duh duh duh duh. I was like "oh shit!!!!". We broke the lugs loose before jacking the car up..... And they're getting tighter as we unthread them. All of the front lugs came off tight, and on the last one, the stud broke off. Another fine job by those over-eager tire guyz with their 200 ft-lb impact wrenches.......... and then they always make it a point to go back and click the lugs with their torque wrench set to 100 ft-lb. .......... yuuuupppp, thar taait.

Anyways, on to the back shocks. They're the hardest with all of that plastic that has to come out....... and the 2+2 is even more of a pain. The car already has aftermarket springs, so I know it's been worked on before. The easy part is getting the shocks out, changing the springs over to the new shocks and putting them back in. Left one goes in fine. Right one goes in, we go to tighten the top nuts and snap. The damn stud breaks off the top shock mount. Now what do we do? Crap, pull it back out. Re-compress the spring and take the mount off. I end up drilling out the broken stud and just putting a bolt in. It's held in place by the rubber spring dampener. So, while I let the guy put everything back together on the rear shock, i go finish cleaning my car. He gets it all back together, we go to put it in, and he forgot to align the studs on the top mount with the ears on the bottom. Back to the workbench to compress the spring again to align the studs up. Finally we get the rear end all back together, 3-1/2 hours later.

So much for the Z BBQ, I won't get there till 3:pm. It started at noon. O.k., the fronts have to be easier, I'll be done in time to get to the LAZ32 meet that starts at 3:pm.

Off to the fronts. They come out of the car just fine. Compress the springs just fine. Go to loosen the nuts...... ain't happening. We wrench and we wrench till the flats on the end of the shock are rounded off. We vise-grip the shit outta the shaft.... no budgy. I try every grinding / cut-off wheel that I have to reach in past the spring and cut the shock shaft......... nope. I end up having to take the die grinder and cut the nut in half to get it off. How the hell that nut was rusted on like that, I'll never know.

One front down, one front to go. Off to the local auto parts first. Hopefully they have the wheel stud so we don't have to go another 25 miles to the next closest auto parts store. Luckily, we get the only one they have, and it's the right one.

Back to the other front shock, I get the new stud in while the guy grinds his nut in half. All goes well from there. Surprisingly, replacing the o2's takes all of about 20 minutes. By then, it was a 7-1/2 hour job..... too late for the hour drive to the Z meet....... time for a drink instead.