Blown strut or other problem after spring install?

[jesperswe]

Damnit that's low and nice, why didn't i get the sportlines. The prokit lower to little i realized. Well might aswell get me some coilovers instead :p

[Keenercarguy]

Originally Posted by Racecomp Engineering

The trick is this:

When reinstalling the top nut in the rear the best way to prevent the shaft from spinning is to put a LONG screw driver thru the bottom eyelet of the shock. Have a friend( STRONG FRIEND) hold each side of the screw driver with his feel. Then he should PULL UP on the rear shock MOUNT, while you use tools to secure the top nut. We install A LOT of these rears from Impreza's and BRZ's and use an impact gun....very sparingly with regards to impact speed, but the main thing here is when PULING UP on the mount this puts tension on the shaft and it prevents it from spinning freely and then the top nut DOES tighten ALL THE WAY DOWN.

What happened with you in this case( PROBABLY) is you tightened it but as it goes down the shaft it gets tighter and then there is so much resistance that it wont spin any longer on the threads so naturally most think that its bottomed out and its secure. WRONG. Its not and so it makes noise.

This can be done without an impact gun and requires more work but can be done.

Hope that helps you understand why. I say this after having 30-35 people bring their cars in with a rear noise and we show them what and why.

Myles

So I installed RCE Yellows two days ago an yesterday I had the window down and I noticed the same sounds the OP described also on just the back left. When doing the work with hand tools do you need to use a friend to hold up the shock mount OR can you use a pass through wrench (with handle extender) and an Allen key (also with an extension) in order to get the necessary torque while holding the shaft with the allen key? I was intending to actually do both when I take off the strut again tonight but I'm still curious.