2006-07 Dodge Ram 1500 Front & Rear 8 Piece Suspension Kit TRQ SKA67248

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Hi, I'm Mike from 1A Auto. I hope this how-to video helps you out, and next time you need parts for your vehicle, think of 1AAuto.com. Thanks.

In this video, we're going to show you how to replace the rear shock absorbers in a 2008 Dodge Ram pickup. This is for non-mega cab trucks. The items you're going to need for this repair include a pair of rear shocks from 1AAuto.com, we do recommend you do these the same way we do the struts or any other suspension component, replacing in pairs, and you'll need a 21mm and a 22mm deep socket, some extensions, a ratchet, a breaker bar, a 21mm wrench, and a torque wrench. You're also going to want a jack and a set of jack stands.

With the vehicle on the ground, using a 22mm socket and breaker bar, break the lug nuts for your wheel loose. These chrome lug nuts tend to be swollen, so make sure your socket's on there good. Once your lug nuts are loose, raise and support the vehicle with the jack and jack stands. This wheel and tire assembly, being a big off-road tire and 20 inch wheel, it's going to be real heavy, so we're only going to bring it up a little bit when we take it off. Remove the wheel and tire from the hub.

Remove the bottom bolt for the rear shock using a 21mm wrench, a 21mm socket, and breaker bar. After you break the nut loose, you can switch to a ratchet. Remove the bottom bolt. Sometimes if they get really stuck on there, you can rotate the ratchet up and just hold it against the bottom of the axle so you don't have to strain your other hand to hold the bolt steady. Remove the nut and push the bolt through.

Use your 21mm wrench to hold the nut on the back side of the upper shock bolt. Using a 21mm socket and extension and a breaker bar, we're going to brace the wrench against the bottom of the bed there. After we've broken the bolt loose, we'll switch over to a ratchet to get it out faster. Remove the nut on the back first, support the shock, remove the upper bolt, and remove the shock from the vehicle.

Here we have our old part that we removed from our vehicle. This is an aftermarket replacement, this is not the OEM part that we took out. Here we have our new part from 1AAuto.com. These come shipped with this little band on them to keep them compressed, which makes them smaller and easier to package. All you have to do is push down, remove that, what you'll see is exactly the same as our old part.

Reinstall the top of the shock into the upper mount. Send your bolt through, and start the nut on the back. Before tightening, we'll also line up our lower shock mount, setting that bolt as well. It may help if you spin it a little with a ratchet to help center everything up nicely. Be sure that it's not fighting, or that means that it could be bound up against a thread and strip out your bolt. Start that nut as well. Support the nut on the back of your upper shock with a 21mm wrench. Use that socket ratchet and extension to tighten up the bolt.

If you've rested the wrench against the frame to support it while you tighten up with the socket and ratchet, you want to lift that up and hold it now so it doesn't get locked against there, and torque to 100 foot-pounds. Tighten up the bottom bolt with the same socket, ratchet, and wrench. Torque to 100 foot-pounds.

Start your lug nuts by hand. Tighten the lugs as far as you can. Remember to bring the wheel down evenly and always tighten in a cross pattern. Once the lugs are as tight as you can get them with the tire in the air, put partial weight of the vehicle on the ground by lowering it off your jack stands. Torque your lug nuts to 135 foot-pounds in a cross pattern.

Thanks for tuning in. We hope this video helped you out. Next time you need parts for your car, please visit 1AAuto.com. Also check out our other helpful how-to and diagnosis videos.

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Hi, I'm Mike from 1A Auto. I hope this how-to video helps you out and next time you need parts for your vehicle, think of 1aauto.com. Thanks.

In this video we're going to show you how to replace the rear shocks on this 2002 GMC 2500. The only tools you'll need for this job are two 21mm wrenches either a large wrench or two sockets with a ratchet and a breaker bar.
You don't even have to raise the vehicle. You definitely don't have to take off the rear wheels. You don't even have to raise the vehicle you just need to secure it with blocks and you can actually just crawl underneath and replace the shocks without even lifting up the vehicle. Although lifting up the vehicle does make it a little easier.

You can see I got the truck on the lift. I also got the rear end supportive. You basically want to jack your truck up. The best place to jack your truck up is here and then you can put a safety jack stand under here on each side or you can actually put safety stands right underneath the axle tubes right here, that's probably the best place then put all the weight on the axle.

I have it supported here for two reasons, for safety and also pushing up on the axle a little bit contracts the shocks some which takes some of the pressure off of them. Basically when you have all the weight off of the axle or the axle hanging down, the shocks are actually what's holding it up. You don't want to have the axle hanging down and then just crank the shocks because then your rear end is going to fall down further.

Start by spraying penetrating oil on the bolts, this side and the other side. We're going to replace both shocks at once. Always replace shocks in pairs. Working on this little bolt first, you got to want either a breaker bar, 21mm socket. You can also use a ratchet with a pipe on it. That gives you some extra leverage. I'll use the breaker bar here and get this on the right way. It seems to come apart pretty easily. Swap the pipe around. I'll speed it up here. I take the nut off but I don't remove the bolt from the shock yet. Hope for the same results. Bolt's turning.

Here again I'll just speed it up as I'm working those wrenches and removing the nut from the end of the bolt.
Going back down here. At this step if you got the rear end, if you actually are working on the ground you can do this without even jack and jack stands. At this point be very careful, as you pull this bolt out the shock may want to go down.

Mine are in pretty rough shape. We're not even doing much still the bolt has come right out.

Just for reference, here's my old shock. If you press it down. It pretty much stays down. On the new shock, you can see it has band on it. If you press it down it actually slowly comes up.

I pull my old shock up. You can see I can just press right down and it just takes a whole lot more force on the new shock.

With the new shock, put it up there in place. You put the bolt through and the spot on the nut. Now swing this into place, and on.

From here on out I'm just going to use fast forward. Use your breaker bar and your ratchet to tighten them up. Basically tighten them up as tight as you can with that ratchet. That's good. These bolts should be probably torqued to about 70 to 75 foot-pounds. Once you have them all tighten up, obviously replace the other side. Your car would be riding smoother down the road.

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Brought to you by 1AAuto.com, your source for quality replacement parts and the best service on the Internet.

Hi, I'm Mike from 1A Auto. I hope this how-to video helps you out, and next time you need parts for your vehicle, think of 1AAuto.com. Thanks.

In this video, we're going to show you how to install the strut and spring assembly in this 2008 Dodge Ram 1500. We do this on the passenger side, but the driver side is the same procedure.

You'll need a new strut assembly from 1AAuto.com, 15 to 35 millimeter sockets, ratchet, extensions, and a breaker bar, along with the same size wrenches, a small pick, hammer, bungee cord or mechanics wire, pry bar, small flat blade screwdriver, a punch, torque wrench, and jack and jack stands.

With the vehicle on the ground, using a 22-millimeter socket and breaker bar, break the lug nuts for your wheel loose. These chrome lug nuts tend to be swollen, so make sure your socket's on there good. Using a small pick, remove the center cap from the wheel. Using a 35-millimeter socket and a breaker bar, crack the axle nut loose. Raise and support your vehicle, and finish removing the lug nuts. Remove the wheel and tire from the hub.

Using a 24 millimeter socket and a breaker bar on the nut, and the 21 millimeter wrench on the bolt on the other side of the control arm, remove the bottom bolt for the strut from the lower control arm. Leave the nut. Flush with the end of the bolt.

Using a hammer, carefully hit the end, making sure that the nut does not come farther in or out than the end of the bolt, as to avoid damaging either of them. When you get to the end and you know it's moving, you can let a few threads out. Once the bolt's far enough through that you can't have the nut threaded on any more carefully, tap the end of the stud here. Make sure that if it looks like it's mushrooming over, you stop.

I've stacked three wrenches together that are wider than the shank of the bolt, but narrower than the flange on the back of the head. I'm going to stack those between the bolt control arm, push out against the back of the nut with them, while we turn it out with a 21 millimeter socket and ratchet. You may have to add more wrenches to the stack as the bolt comes farther out.

We've now added a sixth wrench, and I have an assistant prying down the control arm while I turn the bolt out. Using a 15 millimeter wrench, remove the three nuts on the top of the strut. If you have a ratcheting wrench or very shallow ratchet, you could use that as well. It might actually be a little bit easier for you. Remove the two 21 millimeter bolts securing the caliper bracket to the spindle.

We're going to use a 21 millimeter socket and a breaker bar. Once you crack them loose, go ahead and switch to a ratchet. Remove the caliper and carrier assembly. Using a bungee cord, mechanics wire, or a zip tie, secure it off to the frame and out of the way. Remove the rotor. Place it off to the side. Using a 22 millimeter box end wrench bottom of the upper bolt joint and use another wrench locked in to the open end to break it loose. Remove it the rest of the way.

One of the ways to remove this upper bolt joint without damaging it is to use a hammer and hit the side of where the stud goes through to egg the hole out for a second, and allow it to pop out. Be careful not to hit it too hard because this is aluminum, and you can crack and break it much easier than a cast steel piece. You can also try using a pry bar to put some upward tension on the control arm. Brace the hub with a pry bar, and finish removing your axle nut.

Behind the fender liner is the wheel speed sensor connector. Using a small flat blade screwdriver, pop up on the red safety tab. Push in and remove the connector. Using a small flat blade screwdriver, unsnap the connectors from the harness under the control arm, allow the ABS sensor to hang. Remove the lower portion of the sway bar from the lower control arm. Ours has an 18-millimeter hex on the top side. If yours isn't there, you can use a pair of vise grips to hold this metal collar on the top side and an 18 millimeter socket and ratchet to remove the nut on the bottom. Using a punch in the center hole here on the CV axle, I'm going to go ahead and knock it out of the hub with a hammer.

Once the splines are free, we'll allow the upper control arm out of the spindle. Finish working the axle out. Using a pry bar bring the lower control arm down out of the sway bar, going to push down on the spindle while holding the strut up into the mount. Move the bottom off to the side and allow it to drop through.

Here we have our old part from the vehicle and our new part from 1AAuto.com. As you could see, we have the same strut mounts up top, same spring, same strut assembly, same amount at the bottom. The only thing that's different is that it's up top here. We have a spacer for the lift and level on our truck. That just means that it makes the front of the truck sit a little bit higher so we can clear those big wheels and tires. This simply unbolts, bolts over to our new quick strut assembly, and bolts right back into the vehicle. This means that our new part comes complete with the spring already installed under the new strut mount onto our new strut assembly.

Now you don't have to worry about the headache and high risk of using a spring compressor at home. Simply remove your old part, and install your new one, just like factory.

We've placed our strut spring assembly into a vise so we can remove the three 15 millimeter nuts holding our leveling spacer onto the strut assembly. Start all of the nuts. We don't have a socket that can get in here, but if you do, the torque spec for these is 45 foot-pounds. Reinstall the strut.

Line up the bolts on the strut mount into the frame. Tighten the nuts on the top of the strut mount. Again, if you can get a torque wrench in there, it's going to be 45 foot-pounds on these nuts as well. Reinstall the bottom of the sway bar link into the control arm. Start the nut on the bottom of the lower sway bar link joint, counter hold the base of the lower joint with an 18 millimeter wrench. Tighten the nut with an 18 millimeter socket and ratchet.

You'll notice in the next few shots that the sway bar length is not connected in the video, despite us having just shown you the step to install it. You should be able to install your sway bar link after you've installed the strut and upper control arms, but in our case our vehicle is lifted, and we went through a few steps before realizing we had the incorrect sway bar link, meaning we had to go back a few steps in order to install it.

We're inserting a pry bar into the slot of the lower control arm so we can pry the strut over to the bushing. Install the punch. Hammer the punch in to help line up. Line up the bolt hole by manipulating the punch. Once you're in a good ways and the threads are inside the sleeve and lined up, you may need a pry bar to help line the back of the strut up. Finish tapping the bolt through.

Start the nut by hand. Don't tighten the bolt fully until the load of the vehicle is on the suspension. Line up the splines on the axle. Put the splines in the hub. Once it's started, we're just going to install the axle nut by hand to keep it in place while we line up the rest of our suspension.

Reinstall the upper bolt joint into the spindle. Tighten it with a 22 millimeter socket and ratchet. Torque the upper control arm nut to 40 foot-pounds. Add an additional 90 degrees.

Reinstall the harness into the keepers on the bottom of the control arm. Reinstall the connector. Push down on the safety tab. We're going to use a screw jack to put load on the suspension because we're on a lift. If you're doing this from a jack and jack stands you can use a floor jack. Torque the bottom strut bolt to 155 foot-pounds. You can now release the load from your suspension.

Reinstall the rotor onto the hub. Make sure that you don't twist the line on your brake hose. Reinstall the caliper carrier assembly onto the rotor, and start the bolts on the back side. Tighten the bolts down with a 21 millimeter socket and ratchet. Torque the caliper bolts to 130 foot-pounds.

Reinstall your wheel and tire onto the vehicle. Start the lug nuts with a 22 millimeter socket. Get all the lug nuts as tight as you can in the air. Then lower the vehicle. After tightening your axle nut, torque it to 185 foot-pounds. Pop the center cap back into place. Torque your lug nuts to 135 foot-pounds in a cross pattern.

Thanks for tuning in. We hope this video helped you out. Next time you need parts for your car, please visit 1AAuto.com. Also check out our other helpful how-to and diagnosis videos.