What is the right order to rebuild front end?
 

Can I do the uprated later Carrera sway bars and rebush the A-arms in any sequence I want or, is here a flow/order that I should be thinking about?

I need to raise my ride height a bit. Shocks are under 5k miles so they should be OK. New brake calipers already installed.

Thanks for the coaching for a newbie.

Any order. But, it makes sense to do them all at once since it will all be completely apart to do the a-arms. You can, however, do the sway bar 1st w/o doing the arms if you wish to break it up in to different stages.

-Michael

Once you wrestle with that damned under body swaybar you will not want to do it twice! It's an SOB. Do a search on the swaybar replacement and you will discover the rants about the difficulty of the procedure as well as helpful hints. If it were me I would plan on doing your bushings and the swaybar all in one fell swoop!

Thanks guys - appreciate the info.

smart move will be to get the A-arms powder coated during the winter

I like the Elephant poly-bronze bushings - he also has rubber replacements; or maybe the Rebel Racing items

inspect carefully for rust all over & do the pedal cluster at the same time

search on yet + another + boring + rgruppe for my thread on this

Use the correct technique/s............
 

uwanna,

You probably were using brute force to install these larger Carrera sway bars on your car? Applying the correct technique will save you a lot of aggravation. I'm 5'8", 135 lbs. (soak & wet), 69 years old (too old with a bad back) and could install these sway bars conveniently. The trick is using a mechanical means to compress/bend the larger sway bars in position for easy installation on the rubber bushings. I'm doing one very soon for a Pelican member.

Tony

I just did the whole front end on mine.... the sway bars are pretty easy if you remove/install the a arm with it....

I would start with whats in the wheel well first and work your way under the car.... once you get to the bushings of the a arm.... reverse the install.

Yeah, I figured out the mechanical means to compress the bar and installed the bar without problem, however it's still a pain in the a$$ compared to the older through the body swaybar! My point was, if you are planning to replace bushings, why do the swaybar twice!!

Here's the order I did it in.
After jacking/securing of course.

REMOVE TIE ROD from Knuckle
REMOVE BALL JOINT
REMOVE CONTROL ARM
REMOVE RACK
REMOVE TIE ROD from Rack
SERVICE RACK
INSTALL TIE ROD
INSTALL RACK
COMPLETE CONTROL ARM INSTALLATION
COMPLETE BALL JOINT INSTALLATION
COMPLETE the TIE ROD INSTALL
COMPLETE RACK INSTALL
INSTALL BELLY PANS
Self TOE check (string) then pro-ALIGNed

Note that I had a mech do just the strut cartridges 2 yrs before, and I did not include the brakes or wheel bearings in this project. I also now regret not doing the front fuel line to pump, or the fuel lines in the tunnel. I did have the pans and control arms powder coated. I used a pipe wrench to get the ball joint castle nuts off, and I took the C/As with the new BJs to a mech for the 184 ft-lb torquing.
I have pages of steps I don't include here which were compiled from here and my Bentley. The sway was a pain, but w/ everything loose, it went in ok - the soapy bushings made it tough to behave once in.