drivability with Blown airspring/strut

[cayenneturbo]

We are about 350 miles away from stuck in middle of no where Arizona. My front driver air strut blew, first the metal casing popped and by the time I pulled over the airspring blew. Can I drive it home with a blown air spring without damaging anything else. My only alternative is a 350 mile tow home. We spending the night in a hotel. I'm hoping to drive home in the am. Also does anyone know how to shut off the airsuspension so that UT won't try to level/adjust all the time?

I'm doing this all from BB Storm and it very slow and taxing.

Thanks in advance for any help!

[mudman2]

I had that 5mph max, in other words flatbed, sorry, good luck

[jagman1]

I'm wondering how common this is. Second I've heard of in a week.

Do you drive on salty roads? Maybe that's a common thread?

I had that 5mph max, in other words flatbed, sorry, good luck

[mudman2]

I was told that 03/04 MY had some QA problems on the struts, supposed to be pretty rare but it happened to me and I have only heard af a few more.

[spyrwebs]

this same thing happened to me 4months ago 04TT. Drivers side blew. drove it home Carona to Long Beach 40miles, A little bouncy but it had enough support from the pass side to support it. the air pump shut off after a few mins. That sucks others are having the same issue. And see the second pic, I did not cut that metal casing. It blew and just with the air pressure, it totally shredded it in half like a tin can

Edited September 27, 2010 by spyrwebs

[mudman2]

Snap !!

[Ignited]

this same thing happened to me 4months ago 04TT. Drivers side blew. drove it home Carona to Long Beach 40miles, A little bouncy but it had enough support from the pass side to support it. the air pump shut off after a few mins. That sucks others are having the same issue. And see the second pic, I did not cut that metal casing. It blew and just with the air pressure, it totally shredded it in half like a tin can

Were you able to get a used part or did you have to buy a new one? Do you mind if I ask the price, parts & labor to replace?

Tim in Ft Worth

'04 TT

[spyrwebs]

this same thing happened to me 4months ago 04TT. Drivers side blew. drove it home Carona to Long Beach 40miles, A little bouncy but it had enough support from the pass side to support it. the air pump shut off after a few mins. That sucks others are having the same issue. And see the second pic, I did not cut that metal casing. It blew and just with the air pressure, it totally shredded it in half like a tin can

Were you able to get a used part or did you have to buy a new one? Do you mind if I ask the price, parts & labor to replace?

Tim in Ft Worth

'04 TT

I bought new parts from sunset. Used is not worth it to me becasue its still expensive and the air bag might fail the same way. I did not buy the whole strut, just the air bag portion. I actually did the install myself took me six hours. I had no knowledge of Porsches but I have taken apart previous struts. this one is very hard tho. Got stuck about 5 times trying to figure out how to take things apart. Im not sure, dealer might charge 4 hours? 4 x $120= $580+ for labor maybe. I think a brand new strut+bag assembly was like $900 from Sunset. This is all you really need. This is what i bought from Sunset for an '04 turbo:

955 358 403 31 Air Springs

$341.23

955 358 725 00 Clamp

$3.83

955 343 505 10 Bellows

$9.86

N 910 956 01 Top O ring seal

$1.64

N 904 324 02 Bottom O ring

$5.30

Shipping $14.60

Total $376.46

[mudman2]

mine was new, 800 installed by dealer

[cayenneturbo]

Well, mine was a bit more expensive. To start off with was a $500 tow to my indy. I tried to get them to use Sunset, but they wouldn't . So instead of $980 quote from Sunset, I ended up paying $1200. Since it is an updated part, I had to replace both plus some sensors. In the end I was out $3900 including the tow and alignment.

The odd thing is my car looks like it is riding a lot higher. I measured from the ground to center lip at each tire and got:

Loading: 35"

Low 36"

Normal 37

I have 19" stock rims on stock size tires. Is right? I did a seach and could not find what the measurments should be.

[mudman2]

thats set via PIWIS i think

[Mr. Haney]

this same thing happened to me 4months ago 04TT. Drivers side blew. drove it home Carona to Long Beach 40miles, A little bouncy but it had enough support from the pass side to support it. the air pump shut off after a few mins. That sucks others are having the same issue. And see the second pic, I did not cut that metal casing. It blew and just with the air pressure, it totally shredded it in half like a tin can

Were you able to get a used part or did you have to buy a new one? Do you mind if I ask the price, parts & labor to replace?

Tim in Ft Worth

'04 TT

I bought new parts from sunset. Used is not worth it to me becasue its still expensive and the air bag might fail the same way. I did not buy the whole strut, just the air bag portion. I actually did the install myself took me six hours. I had no knowledge of Porsches but I have taken apart previous struts. this one is very hard tho. Got stuck about 5 times trying to figure out how to take things apart. Im not sure, dealer might charge 4 hours? 4 x $120= $580+ for labor maybe. I think a brand new strut+bag assembly was like $900 from Sunset. This is all you really need. This is what i bought from Sunset for an '04 turbo:

955 358 403 31 Air Springs

$341.23

955 358 725 00 Clamp

$3.83

955 343 505 10 Bellows

$9.86

N 910 956 01 Top O ring seal

$1.64

N 904 324 02 Bottom O ring

$5.30

Shipping $14.60

Total $376.46

I know its too late to take pics, but would you please do a brief writeup on how it goes? Maybe points of interest, lessons learned? Its nice to know that the bag and parts are available to rebuild one yourself. Thank you for sharing all the part #'s.

[spyrwebs]

I know its too late to take pics, but would you please do a brief writeup on how it goes? Maybe points of interest, lessons learned? Its nice to know that the bag and parts are available to rebuild one yourself. Thank you for sharing all the part #'s.

I'll try to do my best with the photos i have. I do not have any more with the strut apart. Sorry if I forget a step but i'll try to remember as much as i can. It is the same for either passenger or drivers side air bags. I'll try to do my best not to make it seem too confusing.

1. With the wheels removed, disconnect all the wires leading to the strut and the air line with an open wrench as seen in Photo labeled 2

2. Place a jack underneath the lower control arm/bottom strut so the strut will not fall out.

3. remove the bolt holding the stabilizer bar to the strut as seen in photo labeled 4

4. Remove the long 3" bolt connecting the lower control arm to the bottom of the strut fork.

5. In the engine bay, In photo labeled 1 remove the plastic side covers and the other plastic covering the air pumps.

6. DO NOT do what i did and take apart that fuse box and everything there looking for the bolt . lol. its not there. instead, there should be about three small screws holding the first layer firewall, about two feet long, in front of the brake booster. the screws are behind the fiberglass heat shield. Also, remove any connectors attached to that two foot section of firewall. This is the first firewall closest to the engine.

7. you should then see the last nut underneath the brake booster. in photo 1, unbolt all three bolts seen in the approximate location marked in red dots.

8. lower the jack placed in step 2 to slowly lower the strut. swing out the upper control arm twards the rear of the car so it looks like photo 4.

9. theres three more small nuts holding the top of the aluminum casing/upper control arm to the top of the strut. The strut should come out at this point.

10. in photo 5, remove the top nut of the main strut shaft. The shaft is gonna spin so you need to hold the upper rubber portion with vice grips. (theres actually a special tool for this its an open socket and something that slides into the socket)

11.the air bag and everything else should slide out in one piece. IMPORTANT: Replace BOTH the upper and lower O-rings with brand new ones, then grease the o-rings!! make sure the entire circle is greased up.

12. in Photo 6, slide the new air bags over the strut and one person needs to hold the upper portion of the air bag up while another person slides just the bottom portion of the metal down into the corrugated bellows. the upper portion needs to be as high as possible. Stretch out the Air bags as much as u can. You really need two people for this, I tried to do it myself and it would not go in no matter how hard I tried to force it in. Make sure the air bag snaps in and touches the bottom strut ring.

13. lower the top air bag into the strut and place the bolt back on top of the strut's shaft. you need something to hold the shaft from spinning. be carful not to mark up/damage the chrome shaft too much or else your strut will start leaking and will be useless. I just used a bunch of masking tape on the chrome shaft and used vice grips as close to the very top as possible, i would say dont use vice grips lower than one inch from the very top of the shaft. . then torque up that top nut. Do not use vise grips on any other portion of the strut's shaft. You will cause all the hydraulic pressure in the shaft to shoot out. If you have an impact gun, use that and it will tighten up nut and wont need the vice grips.

14. instal lreverse order.

Edited October 14, 2010 by spyrwebs