Cause they are aluminum and you'll snap em if you over torque

Hmnmmmm...not sure that's correct HercMan. They are marked "9.8". When you look up torque specs for an M8X1 9.8 bolt the recommended torque spec is 30 NM. However, these are supposed to be break away bolts in case of an accident and therefore require lower torque settings. That info is from the GM service manual by the way. Also, the bolts are too heavy to be aluminum.

Thanks dude. I have front STB installed on my 03 GP and 04 Monte SS so I am familiar with them. I will be doing the rear of my GP with this one. Hopefully it won't be too much of a PITA. I heard I need to lower my strut to get access.

Rears are easier then the fronts. Simple to do. You will need to elongate one hole on each end of the strut bar. You won't have to move your rear struts at all. Just remove one nut from each strut put the strut bar on the stud you removed the nut from and retorque. The only hard part is fighting the speakers for the sway bar. I musta had mine yanked out of my hands 10 times before I got it on lol.

They looked and felt like aluminum but I'm probably wrong. They didn't look like they'd like alot of torque so I snugged mine. Then 1/2 turn. No issues in the past five years.

Parts came today. Nice stuff, well packaged. Thank You Keith.

:-)

Check out the brackets on this site, just got mine today and man are they nice: www.drcustomparts.com

I like the STB brackets, but IMO the diagonal braces look bad. I would rather use round Monte Carlo ones.

The brackets are awesome, and the guy who sells is really cool, he's a member of another forum im part of ( www.gpona.com ) His name is Don Rome and his product is amazing. Deff worth checking out, now i have to sit and wait for my STB's tho.....

Tried to put on trailing arms today, but could not get the rear bolt out of the knuckle. I sprayed yesterday and this morning. All the nuts came right off, but the bolt was stuck. I will need to make a visit to my buddies house for air tool assistance. My hand tools rarely fail me. IIRC the bolts have splines that grap as they go thru. I put trailing arms on my Monte 4 yrs ago, so my memory is foggy.

BFH.

I tried my BFH, but I had nothing to put against the bolt to hit it hard. The rotor and shield are in the way because on the passenger side, the nut is towards the outside. The drivers side the nut is in, so BFH worked fine.

When I worked B-1 Bombers, we used to go to the tool room and ask for the BFT when we went to torque the axle bolts (2400 inch pounds) after a tire change. The torque wrench was almost 4 ft long. We had one go bad, so the welded it up so it was then a breaker bar.

When I changed mine I had the same problem tried a BFH no dice ,tried using my impact gun would'nt break it loose ,ended up useing a box end wrench with one end cut off then a long pipe on the wrench finally it broke loose enough to pound out the bolt.Chico(pops)

Got the front STB installed directly to both towers. Once I removed the little bolt on the left (driver's) tower and relocated the harness, no problem. Nice clean installation.

Got picture?

My strut tower braces is on way.

Here are a few pictures. Once you install the STB, it makes it almost impossible to check your power steering fluid, unless you have skinny arms. When you install it, drill your holes as far forward or back in the little opening on top of the strut tower as you can. That way you can stick your arm in front or back of the STB to check the fluid. The brace is flat on one side, and rounded on the other. If you put the rounded side toward where you want more room, it will give you another 1/4" as the sides are slightly offset. You will see when you get yours. If you put the flat part towards the back, you can't put a cool sticker on it. LOL

I drilled my holes, then put a lot of silicone on the bolts so they would stay put if I took the brace off. This way I can loosen the drivers side, and remove the passenger side nuts to check the fluid level every oil change, as mine does not leak.

Notice my MASSIVE 10 gauge wire running to my 100 watt sub amp. (Hear the sarcasm)

[img]http://lh5.ggpht.com/72chevman/SJOvzEDN3RI/AAAAAAAABYU/-5ig0SXhcSE/brace.JPG?imgmax=640[/img]
[img]http://lh5.ggpht.com/72chevman/SJOvzVdEYnI/AAAAAAAABYc/8tK_sGfekvE/left%20brace.JPG?imgmax=640[/img]
[img]http://lh3.ggpht.com/72chevman/SJOvzgU9BWI/AAAAAAAABYk/P09M7ZlYsJY/right%20brace.JPG?imgmax=640[/img]