Installed V8 springs

[97 Firebird]

Ok I installed V8 springs and shocks LCA and one piece drive shaft of a ws6 last night. Not goting to post alot right now but I will say this [img]graemlins/fluffy.gif[/img] loved it. The fronts were a pain if you decide to do this make sure you have a replacemnet blots for the top of the shock. You cannot see them from any where inside the car for some reason the rust real bad. Rain from off the hood goes down the valley in the hood and goes into a little hole and rust the bolt. The rear springs were easy. Put the rear in the air and removed the shocks then gentle pulled down on the rear end and pulled on the springs and they came right out. About 1 to 2 hours to do the rear comply not realy sure did not time it but it when fast. One person can do the rear them selves another person would help but not needed . the rear V8 springs are shorter then ares . You will see that as soon as you pull them out. The shocks are a joke from ares to there. Ares look like tooth picks compared to theres. Fromt springs where harder you wil need one person to help you and another around just in cases youi you need another set of hands. Pessenger side you will need a spring compressor to remove and install the springs. Driver side you will have to move your master cyclinder for your brakes out of thew way be care doing this you can bend your brake lines. You may also want to remove your sway bar for easier removing the shock and spring form the front. I will post more later about this.

[Need2MoreCylinders]

where did you get the stuff for the rear? would it be bad to just upgrade the springs and shocks in the rear and leave the front alone for awhile? How much would you say the height of the car changed?

[97 Firebird]

Frist off NASCAR JIM a V8 guy posted here awhile ago that he wanted V6 springs. We botrh belong to another board together EASTERNFBODY.COM. So I relpyed to him that I had them in my car and I wanted to upgraded to the V8 springs so we agreed to switch his for mine. He had everything off his car when I got to his house so all we had to do was pull my stuff and install the V8 stuff. Not sure about doing just one end or the other we did all mine last night began around 4 pm and finished the upgrade around midnight. When we frist put it all the way back on the ground after changing the both ends it looked to be about 1/4 inch higher. I drove it home about 200 miles from his place last night looked at it this morning and it looks to be about the same hight as it was when I had the V6 springs in it. I recommend if you can find a V8 guy that wants to change to V6 do it that way will save you time pulling off parts and switching over. Spring perkes on the front shocks took awhile to switch. If you do it these way you should remove the alightment problem we ran into last night. If you donot have the spring compressor just right it is a pian in the a@@ to fit everything back into the front.

[97 Firebird]

Ok back to the instal problems we had. The passenger side when in with every few problems. We need a third person here. Had to place a jack under the the suspion to left it up as one person pushed and another person watched the holes to put the nuts and bolts on as soon as everything came threw the top. We had the spring compressor on for doing this.
The drive side that was a pain, ok we go t it up in the air sway bar was removed to do the passenger side so it is off at this point. Unbolted the top side and pulled it down then removed the lower bolts and slide the shock and spring there was alot of pull going on here at the brake line so we removed the calper from the rotor and placed it with brake on,ontop of a box under the car. (spring compressor on at this poin I make alot of reference to spring compressor on for a reason you will see in just a few lines). We did the change over with no major problems we when to install the new spring and shock and ran into problems here. It would not go back in we fought with it for about an hour trying to get it to go back into the top of the body (where you removed four bolts from under the hood) This was a pian here, we pulled the shock out so many times it was nuts. We ended up removing the spring compressor and trying to slide it in place. It wanted to go in but was just not there. The guy helping me was doing these. Ended up both of us taking a smoke break to think about it. I slid in place and just forced it in place for the top to go in place you could see the bolts were in place but not coming threw the top we placed the jack back under the suspion and lefted it in place at this point. reinstalled all the bolts and took it for a ride. I could feel the difference.