Driver side sitting almost half inch lower than passenger, alignment is awful

Tough to say whether it is a strut problem or a spring problem while the two are integrated.

If it were my car I'd get a set of KYB struts (OEM supplier) and carefully measure the springs while it was apart.

I'm not a fan of "ready-strut" kits where they've already loaded a new strut into the spring and sell it as an assembly. Mostly because for years they were only available with absolute trash struts. They basically became a way to get rid of garbage-grade parts, ditching them on unsuspecting DIYers. I hear you can get them with good parts now, but I haven't found any I trust yet.

 

That's probably enough, but then saying so is just a way to jinx it and wreck a specialty fastener at 4:50 on a Friday, right?

Even though I don't like ready-struts as they are sold, I do like making my own:

Get matching used struts and spring assemblies out of a junkyard, buy good replacement struts, then take them to a local garage and pay them to use their fancy-dancy spring compressor and insurance policy to reload them. Then you just do a quick swap at home.

It's far cheaper than paying them to do the whole job and WAY safer than working with a spring compressor yourself.

 

Seems to me you want the adjustability of full coil over suspension like what people put on Hondas and Supras completely adjustable I have a set sitting right here that I can fit into a Prius if I want to from the top plates to the bottom of the strut everything on the strut is completely adjustable The camber angle from the top plate all the way down to where the steering knuckle connects everything is adjustable even the damping rate in the strut is adjustable with a set screw You could spend your life playing with these You can change your ride height on each side of the car for road conditions if that was your thing has the car been dealt with any issues accidents any of that? But you can fit a fully adjustable suspension to your near Corolla suspension system in your Prius easily I don't know if anybody makes a bolt on kit per se but most of the parts from a Corolla will fit believe it or not I have them laying here in the shop and it could be easily fitted but now when I look at the Prius and how it's driven and used what is the point coilovers were put on cars that were used for specific purposes like auto crossing things like that. But if your car is literally a half inch different side to side you could use a spring shim to bring that up they're all kinds of things you can do One spring may be sagging just a little bit just because of fat person sits home one side of the car possibly there are coil spring shims made out of rubber that you can buy you jack up the car to get the 1/2-in out and you slide the rubber around on the coil until it takes up that space and when you set the car down it should be a half inch higher on the one side. All of this stuff is available on the open market it's not specialty equipment.

 

That's a tough decision.

Amazon and eBay in particular have been flooded with a lot of counterfeit parts. I haven't heard of counterfeit struts there yet, but it has been terrible for spark plugs and fuses in particular, and lots of auto electric gear in general.

I know KYB does have their own line of ready struts sold as "strut-plus," I'd be fairly confident in using those parts.

I'd just be very nervous about sourcing them from either Amazon or eBay. And I buy tons of stuff online. This is one where I'd go to a local distributor and buy across the counter even if it cost more or took longer.

In the USA, O'reilly, Autozone, NAPA and a half dozen others can get the real-deal KYBs easily.

 

Back in the '80s when I used to replace springs when I was changing struts because I thought it was the thing to do some springs back in those days were so expensive it was cheaper to have them wound believe it or not in California at a place that was right down the road from the original Toyota racing development where Darren and RJ and all them worked so when I was changing struts at 120,000 miles and what not on old KE and TE Corollas I would just order new springs to put on my KYB gas adjust brand only shocks not the gas riders or any of that weirdness and I think back in those days it was $140 for a set of new springs wound however I wanted them for the Toyota Corolla front struts this is all in the days before coilovers and even been really built yet a few years later all of this went out the window with little tiny 3 and 1/2-in diameter springs fully adjustable struts KYB inserts with adjustable dampening down through the center of the mountain bolt under the cap complete top plates that are slotted to give you camber up top and even slots down at the hub mount for more adjustment up and down adjustment of the spring in the seat all of it like 250 bucks what was not the like.

 

Autozone has them, for a few dollars more.
With a lifetime warranty. MUCH easier and faster to replace when
they wear out.

 

If you are a veteran, they give a 10% discount.

 

HI. I just did this for the second time on my wifes car. (First time was on my Prius) HOWEVER we own GEN 2's... both times I went with KYB Strut Plus units from Parts Geek. Was about $600 for all 4. The first time I did it I ordered from Amazon. KYB original quality parts. about same price. I went with the sway bar links that were more expensive. Quality seems to be good. They have grease ports. Job is not hard but takes a bit of time for sure rears are easier. I have used spring compressors to do my truck about 5 years ago and they can be very dangerous for sure. It is why I went the Strut plus route. Make sure you torque to spec and get an alignment afterwards.