Mine are original, but the car sits right at factory ride height. I'm wondering if maybe they used some different spring height/rate combinations through the years. Half the people on TGO say they had to use a compressor, the other half say they slipped right in. Some even say they couldn't get lowering springs in while others say they slipped right in.

Weird.

 

i had the same problem with mine. i had to compress them and used a prybar to get them in the pocket.

 

Okay so I dropped the arms and tried jacking them back up... No go because the engine isn't in the car, and I didn't have a ratchet strap to secure the car to the jack.

Tried compressing the spring into the A arm, then reinstalling it as an assembly... No go. With the spring at maximum compression, I was still about 2" from getting the control arm bolts back in.

Guess what worked? I was finally able to get one side compressed just right to where it popped in.

Still have the other side to do though...

 

Hope u got it fixed by now but I had the same problem with autozone
one Oreillys has a way better one that worked for me and I put new
springs on and theweight of the car wasn't enough to line the a arm
bushings bolts back up.