I would like to lift my CRX

[Christ]

kk... go to a machine shop, they can make you plates that will bolt onto the top of the strut assembly, and then the plate bolts on in place of the stut mount on the body...

Basically, if you've ever seen wheel adapters, that's exactly what you're looking for... you will still have stock suspension characteristics, but you'll be an inch taller.

Tell them when you go that you want a plate made 1" thick to bolt onto the tophats that will still have the bolt locations same as stock, but rotated 90 degrees.

They will have to countersink the holes that you plan to use to bolt the plate onto the struts, so that you can have the nuts resting flush.

bolt them on, trim off the excess of the stud, install studs in the remaining holes (the 2 you didn't have countersunk, you'll have threaded) and bolt them back in place... this doesn't require disassembly of the strut/coil unit, no danger, and if you're good, you can get it done w/o removing the strut from the car at all... just those two nuts on the top of each of the 4 struts.

By the way, putting a spacer between the coil and tophat will NOT lift your vehicle... if you think about it, the spring is still under pressure when the strut isn't being compressed... which means that the strut is at max extension, and adding a spacer isn't going to make the strut extend more... however, this is a good 'ole trick to increase the stiffness of your ride, w/in reason.. it's called "preloading".

[Christ]

oh, if you want to put spacers between the coil and tophat, just remove the tophat from the strut piston while it's still on the car, and slowly jack up the chassis. THEN you can pull it off safely, and reinstall it the opposite way. I've never used a spring compressor in my life, and a buddy of mine lost 2 fingers b/c of the stupid things.. I've always done it this way, never had a problem.

[Tony]

Dropzone, that is why I said he would have to put a bigger spacer between the coil and tophat, since the spring would compress on it. It won't get him the full amount of the spacer, but should get a little bit out of it. But spacers between the tophat and body will work.

Your idea on the machine shop would work though, if he was wanting to raise it even more.

I'm in the middle of swapping springs on mine and I'm not using a spring compressor either. Did one with it off the car, wrapped a towel around it to absorb the energy from the spring and it worked pretty well, just gotta track down the nut and washer because the tophat went flying off. Did the other one the way you said, would have worked better if I took the LCA off the strut and used the jack on just the strut, but I was trying not to take the LCA off. Putting them back together I just used the jack and the car and it worked fine.

[Christ]

that's the way to do it... but like I said, putting a spacer between the spring and the tophat, will only preload the spring.. it won't raise the car at all, other than b/c of suspension sag... in other words, if you have new struts, and you do that, it won't do shit.. but on 20 year old struts and springs, it will do something... it will relieve the sag... that's what the stupid bolt-in spring helpers do.

[Tony]

AH HA!! Took apart a strut today, to get the effect you want from the spacers between the coil and top hat...don't put a spacer there, put a washer under the top hat on the shock body. If you take your strut apart, you will see a washer already there, you can add a couple more to take up some of the threads at the top of the strut, but after that you will be out of room.

If you have lowering springs and they don't touch after you do this, you might put a spacer between the spring and top hat then just to take up the gap, but I don't think you will run into that problem.

[Christ]

I was not aware of that... thank you for that information... I'm actually considering putting preload spacers on the stock springs of my DX... I don't wanna use the cheap lowering coils that I have now, b/c then I"ll have to get it aligned when I lower it, and it doesn't ride well.. feels too soft when it's lowered 2" on those springs... so I'm just going to leave it stock height, and put some preload on the springs... I think... I still might change them over and lower it 1" so I don't have to get it aligned... I dunno...

if I do that tho, I'm still going to add 1/2" preload spacers, since those springs are way too soft for my taste. (Ebay specials)

[Tony]

I've currently have a set of H&R Sport springs for an EK on the front of mine, which since they are taller springs for the EK, I'm pretty sure they are preloaded on my shocks. Still dropped the car a little, but not much. The springs came off the EK shocks without any tension towards the end, but had to be compressed to fit on the EF shocks.

I would have never really thought of putting washers there, but it just popped in my head when I was tearing them apart.

[Christ]

yeah, EK springs are preloaded to something like 100 psi when they're used on EG struts (this is the stock figures)... you can use the EK strut/coil assy. as a whole, but you need EG front upper arms... I'm pretty sure anyway.

[Christ]

oh, and by the way, adding preload spacers could cause a serious problem, being that it could put your spring past the edges of the tophat, which could allow it to bind outside the normal "up and down" motion.

The cure for this is to have a plate made that fits inside the tophat, but has a second step on it that fits inside the spring, which will stop it from moving side to side. so basically, what you should end up with, is a plate that has two diameters... the thickness of the spacers that you want that fits inside the tophat, and the second diameter should be 1/2" tall, and fit the inside diameter of the spring itself.

You'll also need to cut a rubber gasket from an innertube or something, unless you like squeaky suspension.

[Tony]

Well I didn't have any EG parts available, so I just used my stock EF shocks. Will try and get some Illuminas for it when I get the extra cash. Even with the EG fork, I don't think the EK will fit, its quite a bit taller than the stock EF shock.

And yes, if you put a spacer between the coil and tophat, you would need to make grooves in the spacer to fit everything to make sure it doesn't slide around. Even though I have heard of people using zip ties to old coils in their spot, lol.

[Christ]

ew... zip ties... I don't even use those on wires.

[Tony]

Man, I love zip ties...I've raced at a dirt track, everything was held on with zip ties including the bumper covers...mostly because I don't like ripping holes in my bumper and having 50 useless holes in it because someone keeps ripping it off.

[Christ]

Lol... that's one thing... I've seen guys put half their cars together with zip-ties tho... holding everything from the shift boot to the seat belt.

Now, in a hurry, it's not that bad for awhile, but damn.. get it fixed.