Hello
I got my lot-6 DRM shocks a month ago and am finally getting around to the install.
I found one procedure by pfadt that looks straight forward.
But if there are others links to the procedure, that would be greatly appreciated. e.g. do you need to use tie-wraps (I read that somewhere) or just jack up the control arm/ball joint to reduce the pressure? Do you need to get the shock into its normal weighted position, or more, to remove the shock?

The pfadt didn't have torque specs.

It says you remove the 4 C-Arm bolts and make sure the shims are reinstalled correctly. What is the torque spec of that?
(I usually just tighten things by feel, but with the suspension (or head bolts, etc) I want to get it right.

Do you guys normally use loctite?

Thanks
Pete

 

There are lots of opinions on this. When I put on my Bilsteins, I saw no reason to loosen any control arm bolts. I don't think it's a good idea anyway, but saw no need. I made a loop out of string, then compressed each shock by hand and hooked the loop to hold the shock compressed. Loosely bolt the two-bolt end of the shock in place, then cut string and allow the shock to expand, guiding it into the single-bolt end hole. Working casually, I did all four in about 2 hours. If I had been working fast, an hour would have been enough.

 

I did the R&R. With my car up on the lift. I did'nt loosen anything but the shock. Didn't use a loop or tie wrap or anything to keep the shock compressed. Yeah it was a fight and a challenge.
Do yourself a favor and make a loop to keep shocks compressed

 

thanks for the replies. I'll do the install next Friday before it gets much colder here in the north east.

 

Follow up to close out this shock install thread:

Over the weekend I did the install. Thanks for the advice.

Bottom line - its not THAT easy and if you don't do alot of mechanical work, you might consider taking to someone. Much less stress. In the past I've pulled and rebuilt engines, motorcycles, etc, and this job was work. A lift would have be nice too. (but I'm glad I did it)

First off, I didn't have experience with gas shocks. They extend to their maximum mechanical stop under gas pressure. (duh) I didn't know that. For you guys who haven't done this yet, you have to muscle the shock into its compressed state while sitting, hold it with one hand, while wraping tie wraps/string/wire/whatever to hold it compressed. then it is short enough to come right out. Installing the new shock is much easier because you can compress the shock while standing up and tying it up to keep it compressed. Then I got the top in place, cut the string/wire/etc and it fills up the space. You need to jack the control arm to help with bolt alignment. Another tip, the new shock (front) bottom bracket is straight(90 degrees). It helps to take a large adjustable wrench and turn it 45 degrees (it spriings back at bit) to help align the lower front bolts. Compare it to the old shock.

The other major suck factor is removing the front top shock nuts. They sell a tool that I didn't have the smarts to order (made by Lisle), its like a socket within a socket. So using a small adjustable wrench on the flat part of the top of the shaft (pass side), I tied it with wire to some other bolt to help hold it while I used the tip of an open end wrench to turn it maybe 1/32 of a turn each. It seemed like it took 8 weeks for each nut. Back does get sore too.

The new Bilsteins go on much easier with an allen wrench to hold it.

The rears are easy in comparison. Do use a torque wrench for the bottom bolt because it is much higher torque than you might think. (My wrench only goes up to 140 ft lbs, and I gave it a little more, but it was much tighter than what I initially thought was tight)

So, my DRM buy lot #6 is done. The shocks are great in the limited driving I've done. I need to go to autocross again to really test them out. But my car has 55K miles now, with Z51 suspension, and one of the rear shocks was easier to compress so it must have lost some gas. I think everyone should do this at some point to their car. Thanks to Randy for the great price on the group buy.

 

Peter, not sure how old you are, but the older you get, the more work these jobs appear to be. I got to were I oursource most of it....

 

I go 1 farther. I like to compress and expand each shock 3-4 times before installing them. it allows the oil to cycle through, minimizing the chance of noise or bumpy ride when first installed.

 

That's a good idea...I'll bet that his one shock feels different than the other one because of this. I very much doubt that any gas has escaped.

 

Interesting thought on the shock that seemed to have less pressure.

So I'm 61 years old and counting. While I've always done some car work over the years, I was in my teens and early 20s when I was pulling engines, transmissions, etc. Age does have something to do with it for sure! And money. Back then most of us didn't have that much $$. Now I could pay for the labor (like my wife told me to do when it took me 8 hours over 2 days....) but my principal is I'll save the money and do it if it is something I can do myself.

 

When trying to compress a shock by hand, the vast majority of the resistance felt is the oil being forced through the valve, not the gas pressure itself. It is a common misconception that the gas pressure is a large part of what helps control the up and down movement of the suspension, when in fact the purpose of the gas pressure is to suppress the bubbles that naturally form in the oil when it is forced through the valve and back. The gas pressure squishes those bubbles so that there is always nice solid oil available to go to work controlling the suspension.

This is in contrast to an "air shock" where the added air adds to the spring rate to help support the weight of the vehicle.

 

As far as removing the front shocks, I didn't remove anything other than the shock. I compressed the shock with a floor jack under the lower control arm, then took some stranded picture hanging wire and looped the shock to hold the compression, lowered the jack and pulled out the compressed shock. No need to deal with upper control bolts and shims.

 

I did taking off the upper control arm bolts, didn't compress the shocks to remove them. Didn't take long at all.

 

The Pfadt instructions located here have all relevant torque specs included: http://www.pfadtracing.com/blog/wp-c...stallation.pdf
The specs can be found in the images pointing to each fastener.

Assuming you already have a good set of instructions, the specs are:
Front:
Upper Shock Nut 19 lb-ft
Lower Shock Mounting Nuts 21 lb-ft
Front Upper Control Arm Bolts 48 lb-ft

Rear:
Upper Shock Mounting Plate Bolts 22 lb-ft
Lower Shock Mounting Nut 81 lb-ft
Upper Control Arm Bolts (steel frame [base/GS]) 81 lb-ft
Upper Control Arm Bolts (aluminum frame [Z06/ZR1 ONLY]) 48 lb-ft

The project took me a bit longer than anticipated, but still far less time than any other project I've done. I ended up removing the control arms, as that was the easiest method for me to follow. What I did is set aside 4 small zip-lock bags, labeled with 1, 2, 3, 4. As I would remove each upper control arm bolt, I would put the bolt and any washers/shims in the corresponding bag. When it came time to re-assemble, there weren't any issues with figuring out where each one went, etc. I also haven't had any alignment or tire wear issues so far.

I would highly recommend acquiring one of these: http://www.oreillyauto.com/site/c/de...ord=shock+tool which will greatly help in removing the old shocks without spinning the shafts. For the new shocks you will just need a hex wrench of the correct size. Also, you're going to want a set of ratcheting box-end wrenches (or at least a 15mm) for removing/installing the top shock nuts, as doing this with an open-end will be terribly annoying.

For the top shock nuts, you can't really "torque" them because you're compressing rubber with them, and the rubber is going to rotate some and that's dependent on the speed that you're turning them and .........
so what you're essentially looking for is to flatten out the rubber/poly bushings (whichever you went with). For a good idea of how flat, look at the bushings on the stock shocks BEFORE you remove them, and try to replicate that look.

That's all I really remember from my install. If you have any questions feel free to PM me, or better yet post here so that others can reference the thread if they run into issues.

 

https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums...-pictures.html