Lower control arm holes.......

[91grandmarquis]

I had my bro hold the bar in place. I never thought of vice grips.

[andymac0035]

I used C-clamps.

[1987cp]

I'd find a pair of lower control arms with the correct holes, and snag those, replacing the old units. And while you have the new ones out, you can toss some new bushings at them, before you put the new ones in....

If drilling holes is a significant challenge, I suspect busting loose crusty Torx-headed control arm bolts will be worse.

Still, most bushings do need to be replaced sometime or other .... I'm not at all looking forward to trying to do my rears.

[andymac0035]

It wasn't so much the drilling (once I go that 90 elbow)......as it was jacking.
If not for the weather and ground conditions I'd have had this bar on long ago.
Although I do tend to be overcautious trying to not make misakes.

Having said that......one of the reasons I tried a lot harder this time was that I didn't want to try taking those control arms off either.

[88grandmarq]

Cool... you finally got the bar on.
I have had drill holes before, on some elses car. it wasn't easy, but the drill I used wasn't exactly "compact".

any difference in handling with the rear bar?

[91grandmarquis]

Cool... you finally got the bar on.
I have had drill holes before, on some elses car. it wasn't easy, but the drill I used wasn't exactly "compact".

any difference in handling with the rear bar?

Probably for the better, I used our corded drill so it had the nuts to push through the metal. That thing has balls and shitloads of torque. Im not sure a medium grade battery drill would do it, although I didn't try the Milwaukee.

[andymac0035]

Cool... you finally got the bar on.
I have had drill holes before, on some elses car. it wasn't easy, but the drill I used wasn't exactly "compact".

any difference in handling with the rear bar?

Yes, the car does handle better. It's not a night-and-day difference, like...."oh wow I got a sports car", but it is very noticable. At higher speeds there is still some body roll, but not like before. Makes me wonder how much more you get with the PI bars (front+rear). I suspect that just switching to stiffer shocks (I like bilstiens) and better tires would do me a world of good as well.

As weird as this may sound.....the car's ass feels like it's up higher when I'm driving.
(maybe someone played with my power seat.....I dunno)

On the drilling......yeah I started out with a cordless.....it died partway through the first side. Niether one of my drills are compact either, but I picked up one of those 90 degree elbows, and that gave me the clearance I needed.

The (rear) driveway/back yard area here is clay......pretty soon it will be so muddy that it will be impossible to get my car (or anyone else's) back there (were that walkway is) and that sidewalk is the only hard level surface I have to work on stuff with......I didn't want to wait till the middle of May to do this.