So my suspension is pretty horrible and we're changing them out. We just did the front end the other night and we put monroe gas matic on the front, haven't driven it much since then since its no longer my daily driver but was this a bad idea? Everything I've read says Monroe are trash, but how bad are they for a (temporarily) spare car. I love her but she kept having issues and couldn't risk missing work.

Changed out the rotors, pads, and inner bearings (purchased wrong outer bearings since I have a performance package apparently, who knew?) Will swap them out in the next few days.

While changing everything out we noticed the passenger side doesn't have something my friend called a 'castle nut' and said it was really bad to not have but we couldn't find it to order anywhere. Does anyone have any tips?

Anyway, my big question is whether or not I should put Monroe on the back as well? Also firestone recommended I change out my wheel cylinders and my friend suggested if we do that we may as well do the shoes too. Is that necessary or is he just trying to make life harder on himself? (Hes doing this all for nothing more than beer)

 

I'm not sure if these are the exact same as the ones on a stock setup, so you may want to confirm with them, but I found a set of the spindle nuts here: http://www.racecraft.com/index.php?m...roducts_id=400 You may be able to find them elsewhere too (at a local junkyard would be another good choice?).

As far as changing out the shoes, if you've got the drums apart far enough to change the cylinder out, the shoes would be right there and super easy to replace at the same time.

 

[QUOTE=SparksAj;5910059]Changed out the rotors, pads, and inner bearings (purchased wrong outer bearings since I have a performance package apparently, who knew?)

You have the performance package (1LE with larger rotors and dual piston alum calipers) with rear drums? The castle nut you need can be found in the following link:

http://www.spohn.net/shop/1978-1987-...r-Pin-Kit.html

JamesC

 

Honestly I couldn't tell you, I gave my buddy my card, he hopped to AutoZone and asked if I had performance pkg or not. I said no because I figured I'd know if I did after 2 years, he brought them back and the bearings that sit on the outside wouldn't fit correctly and we put the old outer bearings back on, going to work on it in a few days with replaced bearings. Unless the AutoZone guys gave us the wrong part, which admittedly, we didn't check.

I've replaced the rotors twice, and both times they were just normal rotors as far as I could tell(First change was absolutely necessary, this recent change was because my alignment has been horribly bad the last few months and it's likely the rotor may have been slightly warped)

 

"We just did the front end the other night and we put monroe gas matic on the front, haven't driven it much since then since its no longer my daily driver but was this a bad idea? Everything I've read says Monroe are trash"

The Monroes are fine for your purpose. If you were looking for performance handling and the like, KYB, or other performance shock/strut would of been the choice.

I been running Monroes for years without a problem. You're fine.

 

See the performance package below.

JamesC

 

As far as I can tell the only difference is where the pads go? And the strut being a diff color but obviously that's not it

 

Not many cars were originally equipped with the performance package. Your car no doubt has the standard package, smaller rotors and iron, single-piston Delco-Moraine calipers.

JamesC

 

Yeah we'll have to look at the box we got because something doesn't add up. Either they gave us the wrong part or my very smart and mechanically inclined friend was being an idiot. Both are likely