Replacing struts and shocks

[snrusnak]

Torque specs can be found in the service manual.

I think I covered it all, if you have any questions just ask.

I also did the rear shocks, they are very easy. 3 bolts per side, very self explanatory.

[scinats]

I wanted to thank AveoJoe for this excellent post on how to replace struts. I'd never done a job like this, and at 217,000 miles, I thought I was in for a major headache. But thanks to this description and pictures, I made it through just fine. The information to be found in this forum is priceless! Thanks for the tech support AveoJoe!

[nlewis59]

When removing the sway bar, you say it's a 15mm on the back side; mine has a plastic cover (as seen on the lower end of the sway bar in your photo). Does one just remove the plastic piece to reveal the nut?

[nlewis59]

You indicate a 15mm wrench for removing the sway bar; mine has some plastic covers on the backside (as seen on the front side on the lower end of the sway bar). Do you just remove the plastic to reveal the nut?

[kevin7898]

man i wish my car was that rust free, but alas the canadian winters have taken their toll on my 2005.

[petrified.rabbit]

the 15mm goes between the swaybar and the link, not under the plastic cap.

[avguy]

Having just completed this job, I'm adding in my experience with it, and some advice that hopefully will help others who use this thread as a guide. I did shocks, struts, and also tie rod ends, and everything went reasonably well, given working off the garage floor.
But there is one part of this job that might throw you for a loop if you're not prepared for it.
The OP who originally started this thread is from Orlando. So he is not only way out of the rust belt, but also far enough from the ocean to get no rust that way either (must be nice to do repairs down there). So when he describes just removing the sway bar link bolts, it's important to consider the condition those bolts and nuts were probably in (i.e. like new). If you live anywhere in the rust belt, your early Aveo bolts will NOT look like that. Pic #2 below shows what they probably do look like. Some of the prior posts mention putting a wrench on the other side of the bolt, in order to lock it and counter the turning. Although that's technically true, if you have any significant rust, this is highly unlikely to work. Pic #1 is a close-up of the end of the sway bar link that's attached to the strut (the one attached to the sway bar is identical). This tiny nub of a bolt is less than 1/8" deep = 3/32" to be exact. That small amount of surface area, coupled with being somewhat deteriorated from rust means that this thing has very little ability to lock a wrench in solid. You can compare it with pic #3 to see what it really should look like. The Moog replacement has a full-sized nut on the inside, and provides all the holding ability one could ever need. In addition to this very poor inner locking, the outer nut is on like it was welded in place. Just for giggles after I finished the job, I tried to get this bolt off by putting the thing into a bench vise. No go, so I drilled through it and tried lock it with a pin through the hole. That nut wouldn't budge, and the torque finally snapped off the pin!
The reason I'm writing all of this, is give you a heads-up that if you're planning on replacing your struts, it would be a really good idea to have replacement sway bar links on hand as well. I was alerted to this by a different thread, and figured that those nuts on mine weren't going to cooperate. When it came time to do the job, I gave the first one a reasonable shot at removing the nut. I got the wrench on the tiny nub ok, but it jumped off of it without hardly any torque at all. And it rounded off as well, making it completely useless. Applying big torque finally made the nut move. But instead of turning on the thread, the nut became a driver which just turned the entire piece inside of the link end. There was no possible way that nut was coming off. And for the experienced guys who use lots of heat, I believe that lots of heat applied to this nut would also cook the rubber and plastic sections of the link end (which are located very close to the nut).
So I gave up on that and went to plan B. After some trial-and-error on the first one, and doing better on the second, here's what ended up working well. First I cut the shaft of the link end roughly in the middle (fast and easy because there's not much to that factory link shaft). Next, I used the half shaft to lever that piece out of mount to the sway bar. Getting that piece out of the way gave more room to cut. Finally, I used a Dremmel to cut the link mount away from the sway bar. Although this could be done by cutting through the nut on the back of the sway bar, I chose to cut through that PITA worthless nub on the front of the sway bar. Pic #4 shows the position of the Dremmel with a metal cutter positioned in the location that the cut is made. Again, this is the strut, but the sway bar will look the same. It was a really tight area to work inside of with my Dremmel - perhaps a different type of angle grinder would have an easier time of it. But it really doesn't take too long, after getting the hang of moving the Dremmel around the work. And of course you don't have to remove the part of the link attached to the old strut, because all of that is going into the trash bin.
This was my experience and of course YMMV. And if anyone has a better way of doing this job, by all means post it for others to benefit from.

[milesvinson]

Wow! How did you find strut links w/ grease fittings? I just replaced all of those parts recently and all of the links I found to fit my wife's 2007 Aveo5 did not have grease fittings. That apears to be one heavy duty looking strut link. Mine looked no where near as meaty. I ended up using the NAPA suspension line parts.

[milesvinson]

Have you ever tried using AEROKROIL? It is the best rust buster I have ever used. It makes PB Blaster seem like water. It is not available in stores though. You have to order directly from the company or you may be able to find it at a industrial supply vendor. They use it around the power plants, chemical plants, refineries, etc. Just make sure to have plenty of ventilation. It has some really strong fumes. Probably not exactly good to be breathing a lot of it in. But it works great on rusty parts.

[avguy]

I just decided to get everything from Rockauto, because they always seem to deliver the right stuff. The links are Moog K80502 - perhaps somewhat high at $22, but I'm expecting them to be the last replacement links that my Aveo will ever need.
In your second post, you didn't mention if that Aerokroil stuff worked well enough to get those link nuts off. If it did, let me know where you got it because I'm going to order a 50 gallon drum of it