Hey guys,

I recently purchased the Progress RSB but I ran into a dead end when I couldn't remove the nut from the stock end links. It took 2 of us to even get it to budge. One person held the alan key inside the threaded shaft and the other turned the nut. We got it to budge and went through a few easy rotation but then the nut hit some rusty or a bad piece of thread or something because we couldn't loosen it any further no matter how much force we exerted. Has anyone run into anything like this? I even used WD40 on it and even some kind of anti-rust fluid. I am thinking of giving it a few days for the fluid to cut through the rust but otherwise I'm out of ideas. I'm also afraid of stripping the alan key thread because then I won't be able to put anything back together. Maybe it's a sign I shouldn't put the sway bar in.. I was fairly disappointed..

 

hmm.. This should probably move into Problems & Fixes. Sorry about that..

 

PB blaster works wonders.....

 

I ran into the same problem with my RSB install a few years back. I bought two new endlinks and just cut the old ones off since the allan key holes were rusted and soft and stripped almost immediately upon placing torque on the allan key.

I also ran into problems with the same allan key setup on my sisters' Protege5 front endlinks. The allan key holes just get rusted on cars where there is snow for a few months per year... so I ended up cutting these off and putting new ones in there as well.

They aren't too expensive to replace, and cutting them off isn't difficult if you have an angle grinder and a safety mask (and wear long sleeves and work gloves - burning hot pieces of metal shavings can hurt like hell, trust me!).

 

The stock endlinks really can be a pain to deal with. That's one of the reasons why we released the Fastline Powerlinks.

http://fastlineperformance.com/powerlink.htm

 

So I've given this sway bar removal another shot this weekend and failed again. I tried PB blaster on it but then I realized that it is useless since the thread is mangled towards the outer end of the shaft. There's no way that nut is coming off unless there are some magical tools out there for this kind of problem. Should I just buy replacement endlinks and do what curls mentioned in the above post? Or I could let a mechanic try and install it but I don't see how he'll be able to get that nut off.

 

Mechanics charge what, $80 - $120 per hour on average? That's a 1-1.5 hour flat rate job I'd guess.

You're better off in the short and long run, buying new endlinks and having some fun with a cutting tool on the old ones.

There is no special tool for removing a seized endlink in a reusable manner.

 

curls: that's pretty much what I figured. But is there any way I could remove the endlinks from their other mounting points? the one that connects to the actual suspension parts? I noticed that it's the same type of alan-key thread and nut but it's a very tight space and it looks like you'd have to remove the wheel and possibly other parts to even be able to fit a wrench in there.

 

I read some good things about MOOG endlinks for the TSX and so I've just purchased a pair. They are beffier and look like they should be better than stock. I'll get them within a week and I'll post updates when I get to replace them