Justin Adams

Hey everyone - Ultra green S2000 owner here. I have a set of used stock shocks coming to replace my yellow KONIs w/ Eibach springs. (They're noisy, and not very compliant for a daily driver in Atlanta, I won't mind the additional ride height either)

Is there a shock swap DIY guide out there anywhere? I know i'll need an alignment afterwards anyways, but I think I could pull off the swap on my own. I'm just looking for the steps and some pointers or "gotchas" in the process.

The local shop wants $650 + an alignment to R&R them. Would rather put that towards an exhaust.

Thanks all.

engifineer

Its a very easy job. There may be a DIY somewhere on here, but some key notes on the job.

In the rear, I recommend putting a magnet tool (like the extendable ones to fetch dropped fasteners) against the top nuts when removing them. There is a small gap they can fall into if you drop them between parts of the body that can be hard to fetch them from. If you put the magnet against the side of the socket (or use a socket with a built in magnet) it avoids that.

On the rears, you simply remove the bottom bolt, the two top nuts and pull the shocks.

On the fronts, pull the upper control arm bolts where they mount to the chassis. Gives you room to drop the shock out. Disconnect the bracket for the brake line from the shock, pull lower through bolt and upper two nuts and remove.

It is a very easy job. If in a hurry you can probably swap the shocks in 30 minutes.

You are changing ride height so as mentioned will need an alignment.

B serious

My pro tip is to loosen all the UCA/LCA clockable bushing bolts BEFORE removing the shock. And disconnect one of the sway bar links.

Wait to tighten/re-fasten them all until after installing the new shocks.

That way, you're not struggling against bushing bind.

Gotta clock all them bushings anyway. Might as well make it easier.

Justin Adams

Clock the bushings? What's that mean?

Car Analogy

I got some caulk gap filler at Home Depot, and stuffed that in tbe rear shock tower recesses to keep nuts from falling into dark corners. Its a simple foam tube. Get the fatest one they have, then double up as needed to fill gap. Leave it in place.

Some like to remove the fuel filler neck to make it easier to get to the driver rear tower nuts. Its not that hard to remove. Just takes some firm wrestling to get it out and in once bolts loosened.

Definitely remove one swaybar link on front and rear, so you aren't fighting with it to shock out and in.

Good idea to loosen all the bolts that need to be clocked at the beginning. So not fighting those either.

To do the fronts, you need to remove the upper control arm from the chassis. Leave ball joint connected, but remove both upper bolts so you can swing arm outta the way.

Clocking:

Bushings are rubber, fused to an outer ring and an inner ring. That means once any bushing bolt is tightened, it locks that bushing into that starting point. To flex up or down as suspension goes over bumps, that rubber has to flex. So it acts like an auxiliary spring.

So if you tighten bolt with suspension at full droop. When you let it down onto ground, bushing will have to hyper flex just to be at rest. Then it can tear as you go over bumps as it has to flex even further. It also messes up ride height as it adds more spring effect than its supposed to.

To prevent all this, you need to make sure any bushing bolt is only tightened when its in its at rest position. Anytime ride height is altered, you need to loosen all bushing bolts, clock, then retighten.

The best way to do this is with all four wheels on a level surface. Like a drive on lift. But since almost none of us have that, we usually:

Car level on jackstands at all 4 corners

Loosen all bushing bolts for one corner

Use jack to slowly lift that corner from under the suspension, under the bottom of lower control arm. Jack until that corner *just* unweights off jackstand. Don't lift it like half an inch, just barely unweighted.

Now tighten all bushing bolts. CAREFULLY. The car is now not really on the jack stand. Tighten from the side of car, NOT under it.

Don't worry about torquing them yet, just tighten enough they don't move as suspension droops.

Now lower car back down onto stand. Now use a torque wrench to torque all the bolts.

Which bolts need to be clocked? Anything with a horizontal bushing. So that would be in front:

Both upper control arm bolts
Lower shock moumt bolt
Front lower control arm bolt (don't need to torque the rear bolt, its the vertical compliance bushing)

Rear:

Both upper control arm bolts
Lower shock mount bolt
Both lower control arm bolts
Both ends of toe control arm

engifineer

I have not removed sway links to install them and have never really had any issue fighting anything, but it is simple to disconnect one end and may help. As a note, I just reinstalled mine last night after a rebuild, sways both connected. 30 minutes to do the job for all 4. Actually, it was 3 hours total to reinstall the starter I took out the day before to fix the starter grind, install all other removed parts (intake and alternator) for that job, re-assemble the shock and spring assemblies, install the shocks/springs, install the rear section of the exhaust I had out for spring nats and have the car on the ground and ready to drive :P This car is pretty nice to work on for the most part. There are are few things that are tougher, but not really that bad.

B serious

Stock shocks? Or something shorter?

Removing stock shocks without disconnecting the sway bar is difficult, IMO. Easier to disconnect a link and then put the bushings into "neutral" by cracking all the bolts loose.

Reinstalling them without disconnecting a link is a struggle greater than one that my ancestors had foreseen for me; after considering the one they faced so that my life may be easier than theirs.

engifineer

TCKlines (current setup) or Koni yellows are the ones I have done the most on my car. I did set it back on stocks when I was working on stuff once before. Get shock in place, use proper pry bar, lift, shock slid into place. I dont really recall it being all that hard really. But it was a few years ago so maybe it was harder than I remember :P

Justin Adams

Thanks to all that have contributed. Very helpful. Clocking seems to be the biggest PITA of the process assuming I don't run into any seized hardware.

What about torque specs, where is the best place to find all of that?

B serious

I may have a copy of the factory manual that I can send you. PM me your email address