Tein Street Basis Help

[Guizzy]

I had recently installed my Tein Street Basis damper kit and encounter a small speed bump in the process of instillation.

When we bolted on the last rear strut to the car it appears that the bolt was tightened all the way down and yet the strut still has a lot of play left over. This causes an irritating banging noise when hitting sharp bumps on the road.

I was wondering if anyone had ever encountered this problem and if so what you did to solve it.

Please let me know!!!

Below are some example pictures.
how it should look


how it bolted on

[aerodan]

Think I had this issue with my front, clunking and all and picked it up on the test drive. I believe the whole rod was spinning. The top bolt wouldn't fully tighten down and just spun the piston rod instead of screwing in solidly. A lot of installers will pull out the impact gun, but that's done harm for me in the past with little benefit. We got really lucky and some upward pressure got the bolt to lock and stop spinning. Otherwise, I'm not sure what the solution would have been other than to uninstall and start again, which after doing a full corner weight at closing time would have been the pits.

Would love to know how other's have dealt with this, impact wrench aside.

[Tbot]

The shaft will tend to spin so you have to get an allen key to lock the shaft up and then continue to either screw it on or off.

[Kyleseghatch]

Originally Posted by Tbot

The shaft will tend to spin so you have to get an allen key to lock the shaft up and then continue to either screw it on or off.

This

See how much play is left on the bolt in the first picture? Grab an allen and a wrench, think it's a 14 metric.

[Guizzy]

The thing is i am almost certain that the bolt is as tight as it can be, if you look close enough you can see that the plate above is completely bolted down to the cylinder on the strut and cant go down any further. (I apologize for the crappy picture)

Could i possibly be missing something?

I read on someone's DIY that there was a rubber housing that sticks to the body of the car when you remove the factory strut, perhaps this could be missing? I only ask because the install was exactly the same on both sides yet i only have this problem on one side of the car....


(sorry for the typo's i'm on my ipad)

[Guizzy]

On a side note Tein Street Basis' dont have any allen wrench locks on top, everything has to be done with an impact gun.

[InsightRacer]

Originally Posted by Guizzy

The thing is i am almost certain that the bolt is as tight as it can be, if you look close enough you can see that the plate above is completely bolted down to the cylinder on the strut and cant go down any further. (I apologize for the crappy picture)

Could i possibly be missing something?

I read on someone's DIY that there was a rubber housing that sticks to the body of the car when you remove the factory strut, perhaps this could be missing? I only ask because the install was exactly the same on both sides yet i only have this problem on one side of the car....


(sorry for the typo's i'm on my ipad)

As I remember from my rear shock install, there was effectively two rubber bushings (with steel sleves inside) - one on the top (seen in your picture) and one underneith it that fits in the body. Maybe you are missing the bottom one? They both came out when I replaced mine.

[Koala Yummies]

Originally Posted by InsightRacer

As I remember from my rear shock install, there was effectively two rubber bushings (with steel sleves inside) - one on the top (seen in your picture) and one underneith it that fits in the body. Maybe you are missing the bottom one? They both came out when I replaced mine.

Yeah, that's what I suspect. The two bushings should sandwich the the unibody mounting point, one inside, one outside.

Also, it looks like the bushing you have in that photo, is upside-down. Bushing is #6. You can see one side of the bushing is "crowned" and the other is "cupped".

[Guizzy]

Originally Posted by Koala Yummies

Yeah, that's what I suspect. The two bushings should sandwich the the unibody mounting point, one inside, one outside.

Also, it looks like the bushing you have in that photo, is upside-down. Bushing is #6. You can see one side of the bushing is "crowned" and the other is "cupped".

Great Help!!!

I guess that’s what I get for not supervising the install and just leaving it to my friends. Good catch on the rubber housing being upside down too! I’ll go over the install and let you know how it worked out!

Love this forum!!!

[Guizzy]

Install completed!!!

turns out that the rubbers that go on the bottom of the car were not on the strut when my buddy installed them. (go figure)

But for anyone doing an install in the future for Tein street basis I recommend putting the car on the ground first before tightening the bolts at the top of the strut so that the bottom rubber may compress for you to tighten the bolt easily.

here's the finished product Tein street basis at the lowest setting.