Finished struts on My wife's infamous soul stealer (Stella).
I did the driver's side "The Hard Way" and I won't bore you with the agonizing details and yes I should have RTFM, or in this case the FAQ'S\
I found the removal of the strut assy went smoother for me, if I took off the bolts from the Ball joint to strut assy. Then weaseled a screw driver between them then a bigger one till i had the ball joint and strut separated. In my case the Ball joints had long given up the will to live and were removed w/o much ado.
The installation was even easier.....
I stuck the assembled strut assy in the tower and loosely tightened the two nuts , so it could move freely. Put the new ball joint in tightened up the nut far enough so it wouldn't flop around but tight enough so it wasn't going anywhere.
With the radius rod having been previously removed from the control arm, it was a nothing to push the control arm down far enough to seat the ball joint and strut tube assy . The rest is self explanatory.
I used loctite red cause that's what I had.
Tie rod ends went on w/o a lot of fuss, used a 6 ton bottle jack to squish them up into the control arm. Cleaned and marked the Tie rod threads, so I'd know where they went.
car is much happier with new shocks, struts,ball joints, and tie rod ends.
Thanks again for all of your hard work, in making this such a great place.
I took a step and have a small donation going out from PayPal every month. When I get rich I'll buy Jarrod is own server farm.
Thanks again
Paul out by Disneyland