i dont know much about gabriel, i guess they'd work good..
my advice, you need an impact tool (the kind tire places use to take off your wheels) and strut spring compressors, make sure you take note of how the top plate is alligned, there is a little arrow on one side of the plate, take note of how it looks before you take it apart...if you have an auto parts store near you, for me it was autozone, they rent out strut spring compressors, get one of those, you'll need em, just make sure their the ones that go on the outside of the spring...you mentioned autozone earlier maybee its the same..you probly guna get OEM#27036
the big areas that gave me the most problems were the brake lines and the top strut nut and the bolts that connect the strut to the control arm/brakes.
for the brake lines i just used pliers to pull off the clip, dont do what i did and strip out the nut trying to figure out how to get it off
. also, the only clip you need to take off is the one thats on the strut. so just use pliers to get the cip off and when putting the clip back on, just set it into place as far as you can push it on, than use a hammer and give it a swift tough nudge into place, dont worry you probly cant hurt it, if you dont give it a hard enough hit it wont go on all the way and itll fly out!
my advice on the bolts, is make sure you have an extra jack to use and manipulate the control arm, strut and brakes with. you'll probly need a hammer and a tap to get the bolts out of the holes, its not that hard..easy out, easy in. also you might not want to just let yoru brake asembly hang out, i used a jakc to keep it up while i had the strut off, up to you tho..
ok, now for the strut nut, dont try losening it from yoru car, you'll do no good, all you'll do is twist the strust with it, so take off as many as you can, i did two at a time, and took them to a local tire shop(not les shwab) and get them to use their impact tool on your strut nut, make sure you have the springs compressed before you take off the nut or the'll go flying, mine didnt cuzz i used the compressors. i also took my struts and lowered springs with me to the tire shop(2 at a time) and did the exchange work there using his impact tool.
real quick like, back to the little arrow thing, like i said theres an arrow on the top plate which needs to properly be alligned. how this works is you look at the strut from the top and you will knowtice that the arrow is goig straight down the middle between the part where the bolts go..do the same with yoru new struts/springs and you will be ok.
and i took off the struts/springs in this order...first i started with the top three, took them off. than undid the two bolts on the bottom end of the strut near the brakes than i yook off the brake line.
for putting the struts/springs back on i went with attaching the brake line first, feed the strut up and attached the three bolts losly, the bolts back in, tightened them up, jacked the assembly up, than tightened the three nuts on top, down all the way.
lastly, do you have a lot of tools to tackle this? and where are you located?
Should I Lower My B12 With these Dropzone Springs??
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