ok so i went to lower my 96 civic sedan today and i pulled the front left strut out and compressed the spring then went to remove the bolt to take the top off and the allen wrench part is completely rounded out to where to wrench or nothing will grip in and i dont have the money to go pick up a new strut specially just because of that lil part being rounded out any help ASAP woud be greatly appreciated!

 

Tap it

 

please explain in how to do this and what i need to do it!

 

had this happen to me and absolutely nothing i tried worked. smashed ever larger allen fittings in and they just kept stripping out. ended up taking it to a buddy who had to heat it with an oxy acetylene torch and then hit it with an impact. destroyed the other strut and i ended up replacing it anyway.

 

i had no problem getting the strut out or nothing like that just that god damn hex fitting stripped out and i dont see the point of replacing a perfectly good strut just because of that there has to be a way around this!

 

Vice grips. Worked for me.

 

this! you can put them through the spring and make them as tight as you can. i've done it that way plenty of times.

 

i did the vice grip method one one of the struts, and this subsequently caused the seal to fail and the strut to blow.

 

if you do it at the very top where it won't go into the shock body, it works.

I have used an impact wrench before. Hold the tophat in a vice and hit it with an impact.

 

yea unfortunately my friend who was working on it didn't apply the grips at the top