Torsion bar trouble

Don’t use vice grips on any torsion bar you intend to use again!!!

The torsion bar tools are a waste of money IMHO. They don’t work all that well, they can still damage the torsion bar, and on cars with headers and 4 speeds there isn’t much access to use them anyway. And on torsion bars larger than 1” they’re nearly impossible to use, the groove in the tool isn’t pig enough and you run into interference issues with the floor pan.

I use the lower control arm to remove torsion bars. To just slide the torsion bar back it’s a little more work, but usually reinstalling the torsion bar requires most of this stuff to be done anyway.

Anyway, I back out the torsion bar adjuster, separate the LCA from the spindle, unbolt the shock and strut rod, and remove the LCA pivot nut. With that done and the rear torsion bar clip removed, you can use a dead-blow hammer to drive the LCA back until the torsion bar drops out the back of the anchor. Then use the dead blow again to knock the LCA off the torsion bar.

And yeah, that sounds like a lot. But to reinstall the torsion bar you typically have to remove the shock and separate the spindle anyway. And in some cases the strut rod can hang up the reinstall too. So really, reinstalling the bar takes most of that work anyway. Making the torsion bar tool a waste of money. I actually had one for awhile, I sold it.