Hey all - I had Koni FSD struts put on my Mini recently as well as the cravenspeed under tower indurators put on for mushroom protection.

I also bought the M7 STB for top side protection. Here's my problem... The pressed in shock tower mount bolts are a wee bit too short for my liking because of the added metal in between the bottom and the top of the strut tower (between the indurators and the M7 bar plates)... My towers are also slightly mushroomed making even less threads. I would feel much better if I used longer bolts to make the connection secure even though I understand the bolts are being pushed up, not pulled down.

Question is, what bolts should I use? Can someone link me? Is it easy to force out the pushed in bolts from the OEM mounts? Do I have to disassemble the entire strut from the car to do all this? Help!

 

I broke several of my stock bolts installing STDs. They're sort of mid-grade... I replaced them all with 12.9 grade (higher than any others I've found of the car!) M8x1.5 (x 15 mm long, I think) 5mm button-head bolts. (You'll need a pretty good hardware supply to get bolts like this. I got mine from Acklands-Grainger.) Use a ball-end 5mm wrench to hold them in place while tightening the nuts on top. I put a bit of blue loctite on the bolts; this'll facilitate easier removal of just the STDs, should I need to.

 

The differential ring gear bolts are 12.9 grade from the factory