Monroe Says They Don't Make Quick Struts For Es300

Yamahafan · September 8, 2010

I have 140,000 miles on my 2000 ES300. It still starts and runs like a dream. The tires are wearing out much faster than they should be and I am hearing the famous popping noise in the front. I really want to get new Monroe QuickStruts all the way around but I ran into the following dilemma:

Advance Auto Parts says their Monroe QuickStrut #271678 (front right), #271679 (front left), #271680 (rear right) and #271681 (rear left) will fit my model for ($223.69 + 223.69 + $212.09 + 212.09) = $871.56.

Amazon says their Monroe QuickStrut #171678 (front right), #171679 (front left), #171680 (rear right) and #171681 (rear left) will fit my model for ($135.65 + 135.65 + $134.84 + 134.84) = $540.98.

I called the Monroe technical help line. The technicial said that Monroe makes the struts #71678, #71679, #71680 and #71681 for the 2000 Lexus ES300, but they do not make the quick strut. He told me that Amazon and Advanced Auto Parts were wrong and that their models likely has the wrong spring rates for my vehicles which would possibly cause problems with ride heights, handling issues, tire wear, or some combination. The cost to mix and match all the parts as the technician suggested would be over $300 each.

Please chime in you have installed Monroe Quickstruts and where you bought them.

rembr · November 12, 2012

Yes, Monroe is correct, the quick struts sold on Amazon are not compatible with the suspension of late '90s ES 300s.

One easy way to tell is that for the rear struts, the rear spring on the factory ES has five coils, while the quick struts have seven. If you scroll down in this post to the photo of the old struts and springs, you will see that there are only 5 coils, with the lowest coil having a large spacing.

Here is a link to a quick strut. Note the 7 coils:

http://www.amazon.co...ds=quick struts

On the quick struts, there are seven coils with the bottom two coils having little space. The quick struts appear to be designed for carrying a lot of weight when needed, as in a station wagon, where the original ES300 coils appear to be designed for a sport sedan. In my Camry, I used to fold down both seat backs and load it up like a wagon. It held a lot of stuff. In my ES300 the rear seats don't fold down at all because there are two steel cross members welded behind the rear seat to keep the body from flexing during hard cornering. The older ES300s are sports sedans, not a Camry.

Yes, the quick struts WILL work, and are a lot cheaper, and will be better than the old worn out broken struts, but the back of the car will be higher and there will be a two to three inch gap between the rear wheels and the body, instead of no gap at all from the factory. The rear wheels will also turn in at the bottom with the independent suspension, since the higher spring force is pushing the body upward. The ride will eventually turn harsh because of the wrong higher spring rates.

I used the quick struts for the price and convenience, but am not satisfied. Soon I will be putting the original factory springs back on along with some KYB struts. The KYBs are not that much more expensive than the Monroes.