Hello all. Today I went to replace the rear struts on my 2004 Buick Regal LS. I had the new struts and all was going well. Broke all of the nuts and bolts free except the strut to steering knuckle bolts. I was able to remove the two nuts from the bolts that go through and sandwich the steering knuckle by the strut but was not able to knock the bolts through. I assumed it was because of the car's age and that the two items had basically fused together. I didn't want to ruin anything so I stopped to do some online research. I came across a short YouTube video that showed a similar setup that used 'splined' bolts and am thinking that maybe the Buick does too. Also, the top bolt of the two bolts has a round head with a flat on each side and I was able to get an adjustable wrench on it when I was taking off the nuts. Now I'm wondering if THAT bolt, the bottom bolt, is some sort of cam setup. Tomorrow I may try a bit of heat and then a small sledgehammer to knock them out.

On my previous 99 Regal, I changed all 4 struts at the same time and the bolts knocked out easily and were NOT splined. That car had 225K and still the bolts easily came out. Does anybody out there know if the bolts are indeed splined and meant to fit super tight such that they HAVE to be sledgehammered out, maybe in later model years?

I'm hoping I can figure this out because I don't want to bring it to my mechanic because it's such a simple job and I should be able to do it with DIY tools.


The arrow points to the top bolt that has the round head with 2 flats. The bottom bolt has the standard bolt head....

Thanks in advance, Mickeymoe