911-TOUR

Fellow Rennlisters...

I recently installed the Bilstein HD kit from Gert. After little more than a week of happy motoring, The driver's side rear droplink mount (shown in picture below) had rotated rearward (out toward the viewer in the picture) about 1/4 of a turn.

<img src="http://carrera.redirectme.net/p-car/droplink1.jpg" alt=" - " />

The two red arrows point to the mount (and spring perch) that rotated as a unit. The image is shown *after* we repositioned the pieces correcty yesterday.

The truely scary part of this is that the locking collar/perch and link mount were so easy to rotate, that one could do it by hand - even after we locked it with a large monkey wrench and a sledgehammer/punch. Clearly this is not a viable solution.

From a driving perspective, the rotation of the droplink mount lead to VERY poor handling that felt like the passenger's side front wheel was loose on it's hub. The suspension was unnaturally resting on the rear sway bar, and the ride hight was susbstantially different (1") left-to-right.

After puzzling over the setup for 3 hours yesterday, my master mechanic (the same one that's setting up Danny's race car, BTW) came to the conclusion that the perch and droplink mount need to be isolated with separate locking collars for each, with some space left between them to garantee no rotation will occur.

<img src="http://carrera.redirectme.net/p-car/droplink2.jpg" alt=" - " />

In the above picture, where the red arrow is pointing a single locking collar must be placed below the spring perch, to lock it down, and a second locking collar must be placed above the droplink mount with a space left between the two collars.

Alternatively, Gert has suggested a PVC washer be inserted between the locking collar and the droplink mount. I'm not entirely sure I believe this will solve the problem.

At this point I'm open to suggestions, and I'm curious what other people's installations look like. If anyone can get a digicam in the wheel well of their car, please post a picture here of your setup so that we can compare. FOR SURE, EVERYONE SHOULD CHECK TO MAKE SURE YOUR MOUNT HASN'T ROTATED AS MINE DID !!!

Beyond that, if anyone can point me in the direction of some extra locking collars that will fit the rear Bilstein HD shocks, I'd certainly appreciate it. Gert has told me they are hard to come by.

I'm interested in people's thoughts on this, particularly those that have already done the install, as well as the other suspension experts on the board...let's see if we can get this problem solved.

[NOTE: John D, I know we've got a number of locked "on top" posts at the momment, but could we maybe lock this thread to the top of the forum for a week or so?]

Thank You.

sean

914und993

Sean -

My mechanic was able to get extra locking collars from Bilstein in California. This is what he came up with in my car:

<img src="http://boards.rennlist.com/upload/RS.jpg" alt=" - " />

It is a new install, so I can't tell you if it is going to rotate or not.

Chip

Robert Henriksen

Sean -- thanks for the warning, I'll keep an eye on mine as well even though I *do* have locking collars.

Chip -- what are all those shiny pieces of aluminum in your picture? I spent a lot of time under my car installing my PSS9s, and never saw anything on my car that looked remotely like that...

914und993

I think my mechanic is just quite fastidious, and insists on making his workspace clean enough to eat from.

Either that or the PO never drove in the rain, and the undertray stayed on until I got aholt it.

Chip

911-TOUR

Chip,

Those appear to be the RS swaybar and droplink bits, no ?

I think the locking system you've got is what I'm thinking, however -- with all those bits on there, the standard Bilstein drop link is going to contact the toe arm. Hmmmm....

sean

914und993

Yes, I have the RS swaybar and droplink. But I see the problem you may have with the standard droplink and non-adjustable bar if you add the extra locking collars.

I'm surprised this problem has cropped up, seems like many people before you would have experienced it, and Bilstein would have a solution for it.

Chip

DJF1

Sean, amazingly so we were discussing this with Mike when he was setting up your car!!!! He asked me if we missed any collars when all of us were installing the suspension!!!I told him no and he said that he did not really like the way they were without a locking mechanism. He then went over to where my Bilstein RSR suspension was lying and he pointed out the collars to me...
He even showed me how these work, but I did not think much about it to warn you to be honest. I know Mike tightened everything when he was done , you know how **** he is, especially these collars. As you know I was there when he was setting up your car...
Maybe one of the listers here has a connection for these collars??

Shant Ohannessian

Hey there, its been 2 months since i got my bil. HD shocks and my car is not done yet because im looking for adjustable drop links or locking collar for the droplink mount. From what i understand and what my mechanic told me, these shocks should come with 2 locking collars on each side of the rear. If anyone is selling some please let me know too.

911-TOUR

My kit came with a perch and locking collar on each front strut, and a single locking collar one each rear...but, since I bought the extra lowering perches for the front - I actually have 4 extras right now...I could use at least 2 more...

sean

swftiii

Is the need for an additional locking collar the result of using the "Her*" collar? I'm looking at this suspension too.

Thanks

Tim Ashfield

Sean

Thanks for posting this, I am having HD's/H&R's installed on my car soon and this is very useful feedback. I don't feel quite so bad about them still being in the box in the garage for the moment - please keep us updated with your progress on this one.

911-TOUR

Skip,

The Herge collars have no bearing on this particular problem. The custom collars go on the front, this problem is in the rear.

Still looking for a source for extra collars. Bilstein says they won't sell them separately.

cheers,

sean

John H. in DC Area

Thanks for the info Sean. I had the HD's installed on my Turbo about six months ago. Is there anyway for a layperson like myself to tell on sight whether they have rotated?

Greg Fishman

I would think these locking rings would be the same size as what Moton, JRZ, Penske etc. use on their shocks. Check with these companies and/or their distributors. Also check companies such as Longacre, Pegasus etc as they sell a lot of suspension equipment.

Robin 993DX

I installed my Bilstein HDs with Eibach springs about 8000 miles ago.

I only have one locking rings installed on my shock for the sway bar link mount.

After tighten the locking ring I also used a punch and hammer to tap the locking ring to lock down the sway bar link mount down.

So far I have not had any problem or notice any movement of the sway bar link mount.

Sean, on your picture I notice that on your original setup your locking ring is mounted upside down. Maybe that's what contributed to the moving problem?

Here are the number of locking ring information for each setup from Gert.

The rear shocks of the PSS-9 kit have a spring perch with locking nut and a drop link mount with locking nut. (total : 3 locking nuts and 1 drop link mount)
The rear Bilstein HD shocks have a only one locking nut for the drop link mount. The spring sits on this locking nut . (total : 1 locking nut and 1 drop link mount)