2012 Chevrolet Silverado 1500 with Cast Iron Lower Control Arms Front 8 Piece Steering, Suspension, & Drivetrain Kit TRQ PSA59195

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In this video, we're going to show you how to replace the right hand, or passenger side, front axle on this 2011 Chevy Silverado. This is a 1500. The procedure for the left axle is pretty much the same, and it's also the same for these trucks for model years 2007-2013 for both this Chevy Silverado 1500, as well as the GMC Sierra. In this repair we use new axle or axles from 1AAuto.com, jack and jack stands, 15 to 22mm sockets with a ratchet extension. You'll need a breaker bar and a pipe for some extra leverage, a 36mm socket, and I separate that one out because it's not one that's usually in your regular socket set. You'll need to buy that one special, some penetrating oil, and a torque wrench. You can replace these axles one at a time, or in pairs.

From the top, there are three 18mm nuts that hold the top of the strut in place. You see one there, one has a wire lube on it there that I'm going to reach down and grab and just pull off. Apologies for the camera shot, but you just grab the wire clip and pull it up off the stud. Okay, so you have your other one there and your third one there. Now use an 18mm socket with a long extension and remove those three nuts. Remove the center cap just by prying with a screw driver. If you don't have the benefit of air tools, loosen the lug nuts with the vehicle on the ground then raise and secure the vehicle and then remove the lug nuts the rest of the way. Remove the wheel and tire they are 22mm lug nuts.

Turn the wheel using hands or the steering wheel. Then you need to remove the stabilizer link. Make sure you put some penetrating oil on the top end of it there. Then use a wrench on the top side and a socket wrench on the bottom side. Remove it all the way. We're going to kind of speed up a little bit, "cheat" a little bit while using an impact wrench to take that off to speed things up for us. Here's the shock and strut in place. We're just using that 15mm socket ratchet. You might want a breaker bar to break them loose, but they come apart pretty easy on this truck. We'll fast-forward as we just take those out.

Get those bolts out. Press down on the suspension some, and bring the strut down and then up and out. Using your hammer and a cold chisel, you could also use a large pair of pliers to pull off that center cap. We just kind of get it started, and then pry it off with a screwdriver. Okay, the nut is a 36mm nut if you have the benefit of an air impact wrench. You can also just pull the brakes, use a breaker bar and a large pipe or something for extra leverage to loosen it up. We'll put the wheel back on, set the emergency brake, and take it off. Loosen it up that way, and then raise the vehicle back up and take it off the rest of the way.

We're going to put a screwdriver into the brake rotor, that's going to hold things in place. You could do that also when you're removing that 36mm nut for the end of the axle. Then there are six 15mm bolts that hold the axle to the differential, and we're just going to remove those. And once those bolts are out, pull the axle from the differential and pull it right out.

The new axle goes right up into place. Put it into the hub first, you have to twist it a little bit to get the splines to line up. Then push on the other end of the axle and put it up into place. Line it up with the differential. Now I'll just fast-forward here as we put the bolts in, start all the bolts in, and then tighten them up preliminarily. And then you want to tighten all the bolts to between 55 and 60 foot-pounds. We'll fast-forward as we make sure we torque all those bolts correctly. And we're using the screwdriver to hold the rotor in place so we can torque it.

Now we'll go back to putting the strut in, and the strut does line up. There is a, you can see where the spring goes into the mount. The end of the spring should face out. Put the strut up in place and start the bolts on. You'll notice we're putting in a new strut in here. You'll also probably notice that there's an old axle in the footage, that's because when we filmed putting the strut and everything back together, we had not replaced the axle yet.

Now put the bottom down in place and take your bolt run up through, and then those clips that you took off of the original strut, put them into place. We just kind of hold them with our fingers, get the bolts started in, and then you can press them down into place and tighten up the bolts the rest of the way. Okay, and you can see here we use a screwdriver to put through the clip to hold it in place until it gets down far enough that it holds itself in place. And repeat it for the other side as well. Okay, and you can tighten these up between 70-75 foot-pounds.

Okay, speed up as we put the stabilizer link back in place. Use a pry bar to lift up on the sway bar a little bit, put the link back in place, put the bolt up through and then tighten the nut down on top. Put the tire back on, thread the lug nuts on, and then tighten them up preliminarily. Put that center bolt back on and tighten it to 156 foot-pounds. Torque your lug nuts to 110 foot-pounds using a crossing pattern. And then put that center cap back on. And then back up top, tighten up the three nuts that hold the top of the strut in place, tighten them to 70 foot-pounds. And put that wire retainer back in place and you're all set.

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