step by step lowering an si 06

[silverciv06]

start with taking this cover off!



next just loosen these nuts on the top of the strut assembly, do not take them all the way off!



next jack the car up and take the wheel off. this clamp is for the brake fluid line. loosen this assembly and let the line just hang.




now take these two bolts out that hold the strut assembly on to the bracket. these will be a little difficult if you are not using air tools. there should be little or no tension on the bolts they should slide right out.




next manuever the strut assembly around you axle so that it is not touching anything else especially your brake line. and then take the nuts off of the topside assembly and drop the spring and strut out.




if you do not have a spring compressor do not attempt this job. any local autoparts store will have a spring compressor that you can rent for like 40 dollars. clamp on the spring compressor and wrench them down evenly at 5 turns on one and 5 turns on the other and repeat the cycle until the spring is no longer touching the top of the perch pad. (which is the rubber peice that the spring is sitting on.




next take an allen wrench and hold while you loosen the nut on the top of the strut assembly. double check to see if there is any tension on the spring because if there is then this top cover peice will shoot off and that is dangerous. tighten the spring compressor more if needed. once the top nut is off you can slide the top peice off and take the spring off of the strut. pay close attention to how the factory spring sits in the holder and install the new spring the exact same way.



the new spring is shorter so you will not need the spring compressor to put the new springs back on. then you just put everything back on carefully and tighten in the reverse order that you loosened. that takes care of the front.





for the rear start by jacking the car up and taking off the wheel. take the lower shock absorber bolt out and set it aside.



now take the rear sway bar bottom connector link off, this requires another jack to jack up the rotor and lower control arm up until there is no tension on the sway bar link.



take off the brake line assembly so there is enough slack when you lower the second jack.



last take this bolt out and push down on the rotor and the spring should slide right out. thats it i hope you guys dont have any trouble with this it is very easy. and if you have questions just ask. these are tein s tech springs cost was 200 dollars and the ride quality is awesome. this car rides great now and will take corners like a champ. happy wrenching.



final product



volvo s80 peice of junk. my girlfreinds car. currently working on it more than my si. but she jusr purchased a new acura tl. so the work is over.

[Ep3racer954]

welcome to 8thcivic, awesome write up!

[Janizary]

Sticky this???

[2fast4u2]

Awesome first post!! Welcome to the site. Thanks for the super write-up and pics!


Stickied and moved to the suspension and brake forum :)

[skittleslegend]

Not a bad way to intro yourself. Welcome to 8thcivic and great write up. :)

[BantamSLK]

Wow, awesome post! Thanks for the DIY. :)

[CameronJr9]

Thanks for the great DIY! Someone after my own heart! Haha!

[larryd]

I like the houses in that neighborhood, I wish they built houses like that here for sale.

[corean13oi]

wow...thnx for the realli good write up with all the pics...u juss saved me 85 bucks....

[shawn-o]

very good writeup- pics always help.

hows the ride with the tein's?

[silverciv06]

the ride is great, a little bouncy on the highway but very nice ride overall. it has settled another inch since the pic was posted and looks very nice now. the car handles 100% better now.

[Bsresponsive1]

Noob question:

How long will the stock shocks/struts last using these springs?

[silverciv06]

well i have lowered my past three vehicles. on all of the past applications i got a very long life out of the stock shocks/struts. i do not know how long the stock ones will last on this si application but i know that when i talked with kyb which makes shocks/struts they said that they will have their application of shorter ones for lowered vehicles soon. so for now i am just riding it out. hopefully i see a long life on these stock ones also.

[thomasorallye]

i know very little about suspension, so do you have to adjust how the tire sits at all? will it tilt is what im asking....ive never done or considered doing this before

[dtexan]

What your talking about is camber you cant adjust it in stock form, but you can purchase a camber kit and manually adjust each wheel

[sbmon]

Just a heads up the FRONT coils labeling for left and right is mislabeled on the tein stechs. The rotation of the coil on the stechs needs to be the same as the rotation of the oem coils. Tein's front left coil has the letter L in the part number this coil goes on the front right corner (passenger side of vehicle). I called Teins tech support about this Friday before I began my installation and they confirmed that the coils were indeed mislabeled. You can see from Silverciv06 pictures that he picked up on this and put the coil labeled with the L on the right side of the vehicle, but I did notice that his front bump stops were not cut as per manufacturers recomendation. After my install the si looks great no more unsightly (imo) fender wheel gap, and the ride is not much stiffer. Unfortunately though from the looks of the excessive negative camber after the lowering it looks unacceptable to me as far as tire wear will be concerned, so I will be getting either a comptech or sps rear camber kit in the near future, people here may say it is not needed (and this excess negative camber give better handling but...) with this semi mild 1.5 inch drop but to me I expect more than 15k out of a set of tires.
shawn

[kicker_jace]

do u have to re-align the suspension after puttin in the springs? n do u have to fix the camber??? tnx

[sbmon]

As I said above yes I think you will want a camber kit with a 1.5" drop or more. An alignment is highly recomended after any suspension changes also.
You don't have to do these things but if you don't you will probably be on a first name basis with the guys at the tire shop.

[bigbizznass]

I just bought some eibach sportline's and was debating on wether or not to cut the bump stop like it says to in the instructions. I know in the step by step, they didn't, so i was wondering is it completly necessary if im not going to be whipping around a 90* turn at 75mph.

[Jrfish007]

Very nice, great pictures!

Added to the DIY index!