Yesterday I spent a better part of the day replacing the rear left strut on my soon to be 2007 Chevrolet Optra5. The first photo shows the trunk with the floor removed.
This job quickly proved to be more work than I had expected, especially just to gain access to the left rear strut tower, shown below.
Here is the area that was the focus of yesterday's project.
Below I have removed the brake caliper and disconnected the stabilizer link from the strut. Removing the stabilizer link was quite involved because the threads were damaged from corrosion and road debris.
Now I have detached the bottom of the strut from the knuckle, and the brake hose from the strut. Next I had to remove the strut mount bolts from the strut town at the top and out it came.
To the left is the replacement strut assembly and on the right is the original. As you can see on the white plastic section the original strut has been leaking and was no longer good.
Here is the strut tower where the top of the strut will be mounted to.
And finally here is the replacement installed, now it's time to put the wheel back and I am all done.
