I can finally move ahead with my restoration project (financial situation got better). My next step is to restore/rebuild/fix suspension front and back.

I am going for OEM or equiv. - nothing upgraded and/or fancy...

Back is pretty straight forward - check the boots and replace the them if needed, and rear shocks - those are around $100 or so and couple of bolts

I do have some descisions to make with the front. I will get a set of bushings, boots, all the rest of rubber "things" for the front. However, the struts are way too expansive ($270ea) to replace for M030 package. Skip at Paragon adivsed to replace them with Koni inserts ($150ea). I know there are instructions, but they involve cutting the tubes (if I uderstand correctly). So here are my questions:
1) How to identify M030 suspension?
2) Did anybody do the front Koni inserts and how good instructions (Paragon Tech Article) are? Were there any problems?

My control arms look good and don't need replacement.

Any other comments on suspension restoration (not upgrade) would be appreciated.
Thanks.

 

I recently did my entire suspension except for torsion bars...I have them, but I also have a motivation problem so I will install them some time. My suspension set up included koni yellow shocks in the rear and the koni "hacksaw" inserts in the front.

1. You should have koni yellow shocks and struts already if you have the M030 package. These can be identified by a yellow color on the shocks and a koni stamp somewhere on them. Some of the boge/sachs shocks come in yellow, but they aren't M030. There is an option code that I forgot (M471 maybe?) that should be listed in the rear hatch area of your car. Your front springs should have 1 or 2 red (I think) dots on them if they are M030. Somebody else should be able to help you more with that.

2. I did them, and the instructions are fairly straight foward, except a few points. Where to cut the old strut was one of my biggest hang ups...the instructions didn't give a measuring distance from the top of the strut...only the bottom...which is impossible to measure without some weird carpenter's double angle ruler or something like that. I ended up through trial and error cutting one of the strut housings 3 or 4 times before I arrived at the proper height...I believe it was 56 mm from the top of the strut housing (not the tube...here is a picture before I got the proper distance (which was around 56 mm):



Here is the post where I discribed a few of the issues I had when putting my new struts back together: <a href="http://forums.rennlist.com/cgi-bin/rennforums/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=15&t=004832&p=" target="_blank">http://forums.rennlist.com/cgi-bin/rennforums/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=15&t=004832&p=</a> . That should more or less walk you through the procedure where some of the finer points were missing from the tech session article. I'll also re-post the whole thing below.

The torque chart at the bottom is kind of confusing...I think I torqued the bottom bolt on the strut to 48 ft-lbs or somewhere around there, and the top bolt was impossible to torque with my torque wrench (you need some funny torque wrench) so I used a torque stick for a nissan's lug nuts which was within 5 ft-lbs of the recommended torque and zapped the bolt with an impact wrench.

Comments on suspension restoration (not upgrade)...hmmm...well, if your car isn't M030, you will be upgrading the stock suspension. The konis should last a long while more than the boge/sachs shocks on your car. Good luck, and read below. Oh yeah, here are a couple pictures of my completed suspension being installed in my car:

 

Well...being that my spring break is starting tomorrow and I have been waiting over 3 weeks for somebody to spend 20 minutes to weld on an extention for my oil pick up tube at this speed shop, I am going to go there tonight and pick it up, modified or not, so I can spend this entire evening, all day tomorrow, all day saturday, and hopefully my car will be all back together sunday. In the mean time, I have been busy getting everything ready to go back on my car...I have degreased *everything*, painted my strut housings schoolbus yellow, powdercoated my intake manifold, intercooler pipes, and front calipers, assembled my front hacksaw struts/coilovers, and done a couple of other things. Tonight I am going to start spinning wrenches, one way or another.

Anyways, I thought you all would like to see some pictures of the eyecandy stuff I have been working on...so...without further ado, here they are...:

First step in destroying your stock struts is to drill out the bottom of the strut with a 1/8" (~3mm) drill bit for a pilot, then a 9/16"(~13mm) bit. As soon as you get through with the pilot hole, be careful where your head is unless you enjoy large amounts of oil squirt in your face.



According to the tech session article on installing the hacksaw konis, you are supposed to measure 329mm from the bottom and make your cut there. It is virtually impossible to get a good measurement because of the akward shape of the strut housing, so I did my best, messed it up twice, and ended up getting a proper measurement of around 56mm from the top of the strut for where to cut as it is much easier to measure from the top. Anyways, the first picture is me trying to measure from the bottom, and the next picture is me where I screwed up twice measuring a 3rd time and I ended up cutting at around 56mm:





Here is where I actually sawed through the strut. I had to go back and saw a couple more rings off until I got the proper measurement so as the new insert would seat properly.



Here is where I took the old guts out of the strut...what a liberating feeling:



Here is the paint I used...some rust proof schoolbus yellow paint was a very very close match for koni yellow:



Here are the strut housings after they dried for a day after I spray painted them. They turned out alright, but could have been better (not to mention I damaged the paint a lot when I was installing the coilovers and inserts)...I don't really care, not too many people will be staring at my strut housings anyways:



Here is a picture with all of the parts (except the bump rubber...I forgot to include that) that comprise a koni hacksaw/ground control coilover set up:

 

Here is where the new inserts actually screw into the old housings(you can see what a shotty job I did painting, too):



You have to put the lower adjustable perch on before you slide the koni inserts into the housing...don't forget the o-ring that goes between the adjustable perch and the housing:



Here is the spring and top perch slid on the strut:



Here is the completed unit (I don't have a vice grip so I am going to wait until I install it in my car to torque the top and bottom bolts to spec):



Here is my powdercoated intake manifold that I did today. It came out absolutely perfect. The color is called metal grey and it is supposed to be gun-metal type color. I like the look a lot. Powdercoating is easy, cheap ($115 for the kit, powder, and an oven from salvation army), hard to screw up (see 2 pictures down...it is possible), and doesn't take that long. I have another picture of the manifold all polished up before I coated it, but it is on my roommate's computer...maybe I will post it in a minute:



Here are my intercooler pipes, done the same gun-metal color as the intake...they came out flawless, too:



And finally, here are my front brake calipers...I just masked off the entire middle section when I was spraying them with powder so no powder would get into the pistons, took the masking tape off, and cooked them. These came out kind of splotchy, but you can't really tell unless you look up close. I brushed the powder off of "porsche" and the 2 lines above and below them, but I still need to sand some of the powder off to make it look better. I like to call them..."little reds":

 

[quote]Originally posted by ribs:
<strong>I recently did my entire suspension except for torsion bars...I have them, but I also have a motivation problem so I will install them some time.</strong><hr></blockquote>


Come on man, what are you scared of? It won't bite..hehehe. So how does it handle with those 400# front springs and stock torsion bars? I wouldn't push it very hard it I were you. I like doing torsion bars so much I am going to change them this winter. I am going with 450# coilovers and 32mm torsion bars.

 

I did the struts ,following Paragons instruction(although my 85.5 is rebuildable,no cutting)It was pretty easy I did it on a sat morning about 5-6 hours of real work.
Gibe it a try ,the Konis do perform very well,and the ride is better than the old worn out struts! <img src="graemlins/beerchug.gif" border="0" alt="[cheers]" />

 

Thanks ribs. That's a lot of good detail. From what you are describing, I don't think my car has M030 package, the shocks in the back are grey (or black) and struts on the front are black. There are not markings on the coil-overs.

Thanks again for the info.

 

[quote]Originally posted by Sasha:
<strong>2) Did anybody do the front Koni inserts and how good instructions (Paragon Tech Article) are? Were there any problems?</strong><hr></blockquote>

Simply the best Hopefully the instructions on the site are doing well by their users - have received nothing but positive feedback so far, but I encourage ANY comments. Also, we do have prebuilt units for exchange.... for those not allowed to play with sharp instruments

[quote]<strong>Any other comments on suspension restoration (not upgrade) would be appreciated.<hr></blockquote></strong>

RUBBER! Anything rubber should be at least inspected, if not simply replaced. If you don't have a rear stabilizer, you might look at that option - was optional equipment for your model.

Good Luck!