satanicboner666

I'm replacing the front struts on my 02 civic si ep3. got the front passenger side strut out no problem but now the steering knuckle wont go back in far enough to let me screw it back in to the strut. how do i fix this!!! its very frustrating. i need help immediately please.

satanicboner666

good to know honda-tech has great support. i figured it out myself. might as well of asked people how to do it on vw vortex, at least someone would of said something. if i posted something about tail lights i probably would of got like 30 people responding about how cool their jdm tail lights are

josh's ep3

Care to share what the issue was? I mean instead of crying about how no one helped you, you could maybe post some info on what you did to fix your problem so that anyone else that has a similar problem would have something to find in a search.

It is possible that no one knew what to do so thought they wouldn't crowd your thread with "wish I could help but" or even that the 3 hours your thread was up nobody was on. This section doesn't get the most traffic, especially around that time.

satanicboner666

the inner axle joint had popped out. I was unfamiliar with honda suspension/axles ect. because this was my first time working on one. i was not expecting that when i removed the knuckle from the strut that it would instantly fall out and have the axle bind. inside the axle boot there are 3 ***** in a triangular pattern that lock in to the axle "hub" i guess we will call it. you have to re align those 3 ***** to slip perfectly back in to the hub. just think of it like trying to fit a basket ball through a hoop thats only big enough for the basketball to be perfectly aligned to pass through. thats how close you need to have it aligned or it wont go in. most people have the outer part of the axle bind but unfortunately i had the inner part bind which made it especially difficult. the easiest way to fix it is time and swearing.


i recommend changing your suspension with a friend so someone can hold the steering knuckle while you work the strut off the axle. even having a jack under the break rotor to hold the steering knuckle in place isn't fail proof. if you can't get the axle back in the axle hub another way to work it would be to remove the axle itself from the wheel hub and put it back in, but id consider this a last resort move. i had an axle frozen in my jetta before and it took a heckuva hammer to get it out, by then the axle was ruined and you'll end up spending more than you intended on changing your suspension. hopefully this will be easier to find in the search engine for someone who has the same problem next time.

josh's ep3

I thought that's what the problem was... Many people (including me) have actually had this happen when swapping suspensions. A technique some people use when they do it alone is to use some good twine or something to hold the axle up in place so that the joints don't pop out. If it does happen though, like you said... you just have to push and move it around with quite a bit of force until it pops back in.