lcc014

Understood, thank you for the head up.

spazzz

You dont need to touch the wheel wells.
On my 535xi for the rear. I removed the stabilizer endlink from the lower control arm.
Remove the inside bolt from the REAR (one towards back of car) upper control arm.
Remove your abs and brake pad sensor wires from the black box inside fender well.

Wrestle with the nuts inside the car then take the bottom bolt out from shock on the hub.
You will be able to slide the shock down towards the rear of the car with the Upper control arm out of the way.
No stepping on anything involved.

Check this link out for some helpful visuals. The guy is worth a couple giggles with his smoothness.

What you need for the front is a 3/8 to 1/4 socket adapter or a spindle spreader tool. With this it's super easy.
You could also beat the snot out of the hub for a few hours with a prybar trying to wedge it apart at the same time like I did on the drivers side.
I missed the spreader tool part because I read a screwdriver to pry it apart many times, which is some serious dookie.

lcc014

Thank you for the tips.

1) When you put back inside bolt of rear upper control arm, did you load the control arm first before tightening it ? What is the torque value of this control arm bolt ?
2) When you tightened lower shock bolt to 168Nm, did you load the shock too ?
3) Did you need to use a breaker bar to remove lower shock bolt ?
4) I could not see any link in your post, can you add back the link ?

Thanks,

Ching-Ho Cheng

spazzz

I didn't load any of the bolts. I tightened while on the jack stand.
As far as torque values I tightened them without my torque wrench.
I honestly don't remember what combination of wrenches I used.

It's all fairly straight forward.

The 2 main things for the front and rear being >>> spindles spreader tool for FRONT( or 3/8 to 1/4 inch socket adapter)
and for the REAR removing the back bolt from the upper control arm.

Be careful in the trunk attaching the nuts to the mount. I managed to drop one and thought my life was over. It had fallin down to the bottom of the felt and wheel well. I was ready to tear all the felt out. I had to tell myself quit being a pussy, it's just a car. I did get my hand in there to retrieve it.

If you have the compressors this job is easy with those 2 previous points. These are what I use.
https://www.eastwood.com/fairmount-tools-interchangeable-macpherson-strut-compressor.html?SRCCODE=PLA00020&gclid=EAIaIQobChM Iwuax5Pm52gIVTr7ACh1lfAqHEAQYASABEgKX4fD_BwE

http://www.sears.com/craftsman-strut-spring-compressor-tool/p-00949289000P?sid=IDx01192011x202447059&gclid=EAIaI QobChMImMr8-_m52gIVXLbACh3pxAP-EAQYASABEgKku_D_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds&dclid=CIKkxP_5udo CFUO5TwodUqoBAA

One more thing to note is, you need your jack under the rotor to position the upper control arm and shock to hub flange on install.

lcc014

Thank you for all the tips. These give me a lot of confident to do the replacement. I have 2 compressors from OTC (clam-shell type and the other same as Sears in your link).

Waiting for parts to arrive.....


Ching-Ho Cheng

lcc014

Shocks & springs replacement and alignment are done. Thanks for all the help from other members in this forum. One thing to point out - I was not able to take out old shock or put in new shock without removing the wheel well liner. I don't know how did other members do that; at least, I couldn't. Removal of the wheel well liner was much easier and saved a lot of time and effort than to take out or put back shock with wheel well liner in place.

The removal of lower end link nut was useful when installing the new shock - pushing down wheel hub enough to allow new shock lower end bolt hole to go into the wheel hub. Tighten lower shock mounting bolt (165Nm) was a bit easier than I thought. There was no way for me (with limited tools) to tighten the control arm to 100Nm due to very tight space available. I could only hand tighten with 18mm wrench as hard as I could, no torque wrench could get in there

Thanks,

Ching-Ho Cheng

E60I

Driver side


Passenger side

Hey Guys!

With the help of this thread, I managed to install 4 struts on my 2006 BMW 530i (with sports and dynamic drive) yesterday. I must say, it was very time consuming and physically demanding if you don't have "at least" the following:

1. Spindle Housing Spreader Tool for BMW (a big flat screwdriver was definitely not a good substitute for me!)
https://www.ecstuning.com/b-schwaben...-tool/scw3435/

2. 1/2" drive impact wrench with 1 1/2" socket extension, universal impact joint adaptor and 21 & 18 mm sockets.

3. A marker to mark the correct positioning of the strut assemblies. If you miss the step, you will have a hard time re-installing them back into the car properly! Trust me on this!

Now with four strut assemblies installed, the gap from tire to wheel well of my "front passenger" is sitting much closer than the other three (strut assemblies). Thus, the tire hits the fender when I make right turns into sloped up driveways. Does the spring needs to be replaced (the car has 160,000 miles)? I forgot to mark the position of the strut top bearing studs on strut tower to maintain original camber, could this be the culprit?

Much appreciated for any feedback or suggestions!