Shock Absorbers

[jajmaselli]

I am a newbie, so please forgive me if this has been asked before. If so, please point to the thread. If not, how long to shock absorbers last? I have a 2004 A4 Quatro Cabriolet with about 70K miles and original shocks. It seems to ride just fine.

[BumblebVR6]

I am a newbie, so please forgive me if this has been asked before. If so, please point to the thread. If not, how long to shock absorbers last? I have a 2004 A4 Quatro Cabriolet with about 70K miles and original shocks. It seems to ride just fine.

That is a long time on the original shocks, but if the car drives fine and isn't abnormally wearing tires, you should be ok. Have you replaced any of the suspension links?

[jajmaselli]

No. The suspension is all original.

[Gunnarrrrr]

If it rides fine, keep it the way it is, but definitely start collecting parts for a full refresh down the line.

I thought my car rode great, until I did an entire front and rear chassis refresh, and the difference was insane. You'd be surprised how much just new front upper control arm bushings alone improve steering feel. I never let them go more than 50k miles now on any of my cars.

[Turbo510]

At 315K my shocks have never been changed. These are the red sport suspension shocks, they don't leak, and feel fine to me. Then again, my car is mainly a smooth freeway cruiser.

[grayjay]

At 315K my shocks have never been changed. These are the red sport suspension shocks, they don't leak, and feel fine to me. Then again, my car is mainly a smooth freeway cruiser.

I agree, I only have around 170K miles on my original sport red shocks and they are still working great. At 70k yours are probably just getting broken in. Age alone should not wear them out, I would be more concerned about miles of hard use. If in doubt, remove the shocks while changing suspension bushings to check them out.

[Kevin C]

If they are not leaking, they are typically still good, especially at the mileage. On my 2003 with sport suspension and the red shocks I felt they had gotten a bit harsh on small bumps. They still handled OK. I swapped them out with KONI FSD's, and the overall control was the same but they FSD's are a lot less harsh on small bumps like road cracks. The new shocks helped smooth out the larger sway bars from a previous upgrade.

Short story is if they are not leaking they are fine.

[JDCinATL]

A general rule of thumb on shocks/struts. push down on the bumper sharply. If it bounces back and quits they are good. If it bounces 2 or 3 times the shocks are toast and you are bouncing on the springs.