yep the spring was seated in the gasket properly. your springs must be lowering springs, i'm reinstalling the originals.
Mmm... never had that problem... mine just slip in perfectly. I got Eibach spring with Bilstein Sport. There is another possibility why it is not aligned... because the spring wasn't seat properly... they have the indent with stop where the spring is supposed to sit... did you check this?
yep the spring was seated in the gasket properly. your springs must be lowering springs, i'm reinstalling the originals.
I never even used a spring compressor in the rear- even when I put Bilsteins and Mtech springs on the car. I simply put a bottle jack under the strut, took off the nuts on the rear strut tower and the one on the strut itself, and then slowly unscrewed the jack's release, letting the strut drop slowly.
Installation was the same, but a little more tricky to get it lined up right. It worked though.
Custom Turbocharged 1991 535iM - 135k mi.