Air Suspension head scratcher

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Longtrail

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Great to hear this particular journey is coming to an end - excellent news :). Thanks also for blazing a trail that others can follow; the value of these forums is sharing the journey and the solution when we finally arrive at it... You deserve a rest!
 

f1racer328

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What kind of climate/driving habits do you guys have with failing/leaking suspension?

I have 116k on mine, all original. Dry AZ driving, with a fair bit of off roading and towing. Maybe mine are just a ticking time bomb at this point.

Maybe mine are just a ticking time bomb at this point.


.... 4 days later, in the middle of a trail in Moab my front drivers side air strut failed. It was hard to get off the trail but I managed without causing any damage to my car.

Anyways I'm in the market for a replacement now. Going to either go with the Arnotts or the Bilsteins I think, but I'm not sure if they even make those anymore.
 

ftillier

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When it failed, did the car drop to bumpstops, or were you able to limp it out with 3 wheels at normal height?
 

ftillier

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@Tapps33 do you have your old front and rear valve blocks handy still? I wonder how different they are, and whether you could measure resistance of the various circuits, diameter of the valves, etc. The front seems to be out of stock everywhere, but the rear readily available, and they look identical from the outside (having never had them side by side).
 

f1racer328

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When it failed, did the car drop to bumpstops, or were you able to limp it out with 3 wheels at normal height?
All 4 corners were in normal height. Failed corner couldn't maintain off road height. Not too bad of a failure honestly...

I was in off road height when it started to leak. I heard air hissing out and thought I blew out a tire.

I actually drove it off the trail in normal height, and raised it to off road height when I needed to clear an obstacle. The other corners raised up a bit when I requested the height change, but I didn't want to burn out my compressor so I lowered it back down after the harder parts of the trail.

I monitored the compressor temperature on my IID tool, which was invaluable at this point.

I hit my skidplate a few times but managed to keep everything else unscathed.

In the video I took, the strut is almost fully extended (compressed it a little bit with my jack) and it just gushes out air.
 

greiswig

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.... 4 days later, in the middle of a trail in Moab my front drivers side air strut failed. It was hard to get off the trail but I managed without causing any damage to my car.

Anyways I'm in the market for a replacement now. Going to either go with the Arnotts or the Bilsteins I think, but I'm not sure if they even make those anymore.
Rotten luck! Sorry to hear that. Good luck getting any LR help in Moab or Grand Junction, either.
 

f1racer328

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Rotten luck! Sorry to hear that. Good luck getting any LR help in Moab or Grand Junction, either.
Already got the rover home, luckily.

I looked more into the air struts as well. Looks like Arnott and Bilstein are my two aftermarket options. Bilsteins are going to be about $300 more for a front pair, and are also discontinued, but I found some new ones online.... Not sure which ones to go with. I'm tempted to do the Bilsteins.
 

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