Rep Power: 0

I have a 05 Civic EX Special Edition 5-speed and I recently bought the neuspeed strut bar for the front. Unfortunately I cannot get it to fit due to the bar being too long (or the strut towers being too close.....).

So I spent some time manhandling the bar and I managed to get it to slip over the four strut tower bolts, however at that point I can't get the nuts back on to the bolts due to the clearance between the side of the bar and the bolt (see below)

Also when it is on over the bolts, it doesn't clear the hood when closed, which probably means that the bar is sitting to high from being compressed to fit between the towers

I suspect that this is due to the fatigue of the strut towers caving in over time (the car has 120K miles on it and never had any support for the towers). Is there anything I can do about this or is there no hope of getting this strut tower bar on?

Also sorry if I posted this in the wrong place. I couldn't find a similar thread so I figured this was the best place

 
Rep Power: 209

yes possibly,

whatever you do, do not force it!

 
Rep Power: 367

lift the car. the towers should spread a bit. be careful, these bolts holds the whole suspension up.

 
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I tried lifting one side of the car, then the other, and both. This managed to get the bar on over the strut tower mount studs, but not straight (as in the illustration) so there's no way to tighten down the nuts even with a lower profile socket.

I want to install a bar to prevent further caving in of the towers, so if the uni-piece is too big, is there another adjustable one that might be better? Or perhaps one that has a lower profile bracket (i.e. not giant cylinders) for attachment to the strut mounts?

Edit: Also just measured the angle on top of each strut tower:
driver side (left): ~13 degrees
passenger side (right): ~12 degrees
They both seem relatively the same, can anyone confirm whether these are pretty far off or if they are close to factory setting?

 
Rep Power: 367

am afraid it's better to get to an body shop and get it in a frame... get some quotes from them, you don't need to accept the job.

 
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Thanks for the suggestion sdaidoji. Any chance you could explain what you mean by get it in a frame? (I don't really know much about body repair but I usually like to have a good idea of what I need before I go to a shop. I've also got a good mechanical inclination so don't hold back please)

 
Rep Power: 367

thats a equipment they hook your car into to check if it is still straight, and if not where, how much is off.

 
Rep Power: 0

If it's that hard to install something atop the towers... then the alignment will definitely be out. Are you sure the part is straight/built to spec? Have you compared its fit to another 7th-gen (if you happen to be that lucky)?

 
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That's the confusing thing, the alignment is not that far out. The driver side front wheel is at the maximum factory spec for negative camber (not by choice, it's how the wheel sits), but aside from that the alignment is fine. I've been in communication with neuspeed to see if I can get the measurements for the bar to see if perhaps the one they sent me is too long, but I haven't heard back yet. I've done some rough measurements between the strut towers and the other points on the engine bay frame as documented in the shop repair manual and so far I couldn't find any thing off. I'll double check my numbers this weekend and post them up