Porsche Enthusiasts Club Forum

As Wifey brought me a new set of Boge dampers for the 928 for Xmas I will be tackling a change in the not too distant future.

Advice from anyone that has done a DIY damper change on an S2 would be gratefully received

Paul

Hi Paul

Andrea is truly the perfect woman!


I bought my S4 new rear boges and springs for Xmas. Have front set to fit too so will be busy.

I changed the rears on my old S4 (same as S2 suspension). Fairly straightforward job but from memory these tips useful:

- the hardest part is knocking out the long bolt which goes through eye of shock. If in past it was installed with anti seize then will slide out, but if not corrosion means you have to soak with penetrant (holes at bottom of control arm for this) and keep breaking corrosion by turning then bolt then knocking through a bit more. Mine came out most of the what easily on one side, then took about 30 mins to free completely

- get hold of decent spring compressors to remove spring.

- to disassemble shock you need to turn nut that holds spring perch, but not let the shock piston turn. Vise grips and spanner worked for me, air tools would probably spin the nut off easily

- the shock is not symmetric. Look out for White paint dot on shock eye and fit new one same way

- getting everything lined up to put the long bolt back can be frustrating. Helper useful as you need a few hands. Use thick tease to hold conical washers in place. Make sure to replace the washers in same position as original

- will be very hard to remove threaded adjuster sleeve from old shock. Buy new ones and new adjuster nut too as bet that's frozen on. Measure nut position on old shock and install new one in same position which will mean ride height will be in right area if it was coorrect before.

- you need to put ring of flexible sealant around mounting at top of shock where it bolts into hatch.

- you'll find other side will go fast once you've done the first side

Haven't done fronts yet but there is a fantastic trick here. If you remove the wheel liner, then it frees up so much space that you need only remove the top bolts in engine compartment, and the bolt holding shock in the control arm, to remove it as loads of space to swing it out. No alignment necessary in this case.

Who can you recommend to supply new Boge dampers? What sort of price am I looking at to buy a whole set for my 1991 S4?

Can you get them in the UK or is it more economical to get them from the US?

Cheers

Hi Rawky,

Porscheshop sell them but I got mine from 928s-R-Us in US for $118 each for the rears (£76 ex VAT which you'll pay on import).

I had the fronts anyway from a complete set which I'd bought in past from same supplier for $250 special offer for all four.

Roger Tyson is a brit who runs 928s-r-us. Service and prices always excellent.

Be quick as these shocks are no longer being manufactured.

After putting this off for various reasons and then having it overtaken by lots of work on the 924 project I finally chickened out and got the dampers fitted at Porscheshop Should have done this in the first place

Have to say it's transformed the ride and handling so I'm well happy

Paul

Great that it's such a marked improvement Paul.

When I re-read this thread I felt so guilty thinking I'd still not installed the new suspension - you did right thing getting Porscheshop to do it!

Will get round to it one year...

I'm thinking about getting a new suspension set up. I've been offered a second hand set for around £500 ( they've done about 5000 miles ) or getting the new set up Richard Armstrong has tested at about £1200. From the history, and the handling, my car has done 191,000 miles and never had any work done on the suspension. I've got new engine mounts and I'm waiting on a second hand steering rack coming back from being re-furbished so I'd want to do it all in one go ( maybe take a week off work? ). On the other hand, how much labour was involved in the suspension install?

Hi

Labour... well... when I needed a new shocker lower bush on my S2 (MOT fail) ..Paul Anderson and I stripped out the front strut and changed the shocker and rebuilt it all in around an hour...but that was on a ramp, and it was Paul

So if you dont have a ramp and are doing it on the floor...around 2 to 4 hours a side at the front as a guess.....

Backs I have not done so dont know labour time..Adrian will probably know though... ?

All the best Brett

Thanks Brett, I've got a ramp so I should be ok. Perhaps I should tackle one job at a time? I though I would be better doing it all at one and replacing consumables as I go.

Looking at the bill Porscheshop charged me an hour per corner Not worth doing it myself at that although Mark did say everything went
without a hitch.
I guess a rounded off bolt could add hours if you were unlucky

Thanks Paul. The car has been in and out of George Morrison Porsche lately ( timing belt, breaks, timing belt re-tension and abs pump ). I've been impressed with his capabilities, however it has been pointed out to me that his knack for finding things wrong with a car that the owner never knew about gets expensive. I've just looked and every time my car goes in it gets 1 ltr of both screen wash and Mobil 1. This adds £20 to every bill before I've told him what I want. I might find out I need all my bushes changed? I'm going to have to think about it as I think I could "borrow" a friends ramp and just do it myself.

An hour each corner at rear is very fair for labour, even in well equipped workshop like Porscheshop's.

None of the bolt on rear suspension is prone to rounding or stripping. The big time elements for home mechanic are removing the springs using compressors (you need to go slow to do it safely) but Porscheshop would have a big garage compressor which would literally do job in seconds.

The other potential hold-up is getting the big pin out which passes through shock eye and control arm. If it's corroded - and most are - it can take hours to persuade to come out using penetrant, turning, knocking out a fraction more, repeat till it's out. Depends on where car has been kept and used as to how bad the corrosion is - can be much worse on nearside just because of more water thrown up from that side of road. Air tools are big help in spinning the bolt to break corrosion.

But it's not a job where bolts are prone to rounding. Only requires removal of the 3 bolts holding top of shock into hatch floor (these will be in factory fresh condition), and the long shock pin mentioned which is a superb quality item (the corrosion makes it stick in the bushings, but the steel pin itself just pits slightly). Disconnecting drop links to anti-roll bar also makes it easier to align everything to get the pin back through shock so that's another couple of bolts.