Not too long ago I took my 2000 V40 to RAVE Imports in Salem, Mass. for some suspension work.

Long story short - they botched almost everything they touched - sway bar bushings, front struts, rear coil spring.

So today I decided to fix the front struts which have grossly misaligned upper spring seats. I have just taken off the driver side strut and decided to check the torque on the rear control arm bolts. One is tight but the other one - the outer one (in the red circle in the image below) - just spins.

This is why I do all my own work and now I'm kicking myself for breaking my own rule.

So I'd much appreciate any pointers on how to get at the nut - I assume it's a broken weld nut - and how I can fix this. Thank you!

 

is there any way to get at the back side nut? I haven't looked at my 2000 S40 to see if that's even possible. One thought is to see if you can wedge a blade under the bolt's edge or the control arm to try and create enough friction on the welded nut... I just did a realignment on one of my spring seats this past weekend and got the wheels aligned. Very nice to drive now... was worth the effort. too bad my son wants the car to spend the winter with him at school in Troy NY. Still debating that one!

 

That is exactly the question I'm hoping to get some help with.

Right now my thought is I'm going to have to peel back the carpet and soundproofing in the driver footwell and cut a hole in the floor. I'm hoping someone has done this before and can save me some trial and error.

Unfortunately that will definitely not work. If I'd done the sway bar bushings myself I would probably have taken the bolts all the way out one at a time and cleaned up the threads with a wire brush and added a little grease. The pros at RAVE Imports obviously buzzed the rusty bolt back in with an impact wrench until the friction torque tore off the weld nut.

It does not help the control arm bushing alignment at all when one bolt is loose. Time is money and giving the customer his car back in a dangerous condition is business as usual I guess. And until today I'd been telling myself, well, they botched everything they touched but at least they didn't break anything.....

 

May be making progress here. Looks like the nut is in the subframe itself. At this point it would have been so much easier just to do the sway bar bushings myself dammit.

Edit: the nut is definitely in the unibody not the subframe.



Still looking for suggestions on how to fix this. Thanks.

 

So I'm elbows deep in the project I paid the pros to do so I wouldn't have to do it - lol.

Front struts are out, passenger side drive axle is out (the pros broke the CV boot), bottom bracket with engine mounts is off. And it just keeps getting better. You will not believe the condition of the driver side strut. Photos to follow later.

Anyway, going to fix everything. Subframe, struts, steering rack, drive axle and oil pan o-rings and turbo drain seal.

One more thing I've learned is there are four different factory front coil springs for the 2000 V40 and S40. RAVE Imports installed the longest factory springs for some unknown reason which resulted in a nose high stance. I'm ordering the shortest springs which will drop the front of the car by 27 mm - just over an inch - and also make it easier to assemble the struts.

 

Sorry to hear about your troubles. Unfortunately all I can offer is cheering from the sidelines. My 2001 has never had the control arms replaced so I have never had those bolt off.

 

I guess this thread will be the map for the next person with this problem then.

I'm still working on all the other stuff but I have carefully measured the location of the control arm bolt and marked a location in the driver footwell. Before I go to town with a hole saw I'm going to drill a smaller hole and use my inspection camera to see what's in there.

I did find a video on YouTube of a Chrysler PT Cruiser with the same problem and Chrysler are apparently (could be a coincidence) helpful enough to identify the cutting location with a circular indent. Not so with Volvo.

One of my newish sway bar links has torn boots and is spitting grease. This kind of stuff is normal when you pay people to work on your car.

 

Strut upper spring seat alignment is very important because the bearing surfaces on the upper spring seat and strut mount (insulator) will be parallel and at 90 degrees to the shock rod only when the upper spring seat is correctly aligned.

So this is what happens when you grossly misalign the upper spring seat. The bearing surfaces for the bearing are not parallel, the bearing does not seat properly and the shock rod contacts the upper spring seat. And yes, I paid someone for this advanced level of $*@&ery.

 

A stroke of luck. I've been thinking about buying one of these for years and today I found one on Craig's List, new in the box for $400.

 

whoa, I could have rented that from you a week ago! The S40 struts are a pain with their long springs (I can do struts on an 850 in about 1:15 a side using standard death sticks!)

 

Yeah, I'm tired of messing with the worthless death sticks. They're OK for some struts but for others like the S40 struts, it's a giant PITA to get the spring compressed far enough and straight enough at the same time. I did my V40 struts once with the death sticks but from now on I'm flying Branick Airways First Class.