2Ghetto The Rusty Trombone

[85Yota]

Copy that's how I always do them as well. I've seen some guys have a rubber cap with an AC vacuum pump on it and use that to suck any air out of the oil, just was curious if that's what the pro's do or not.

I know some fancy OEM shocks are fully assembled completely submerged in oil so there is no chance of any air getting in the shock.

 

[WW_RANGER_X]

I havent done the Vacuum process yet. I'd really like to at some point though.

 

[DialedShockPrep]

The flipping method is mandatory on bypasses to bleed the air out. Coilovers you also have to cycle the ifp as well to bleed the hoses, and i also have a vacuum setup to assist with some funky shaped hoses and such BUT at the end of the day you are still submerging a piston assembly that has trapped air pockets in it. It takes awhile to pull the air fully out of the piston assembly and shim stacks, and once you get into the larger +3.5” shocks that timeline grows exponentially.

I don’t care if you are a backyard guy and just zipping through your shocks to get them back together and on the truck, what i do care about is the guys charging boatloads of cash for these services and they barely flip the shocks, pop the pistons in, and call it a day. Short of having bleed screws in the shocks to bleed off the air, i don’t think there really is a way to truly have 100% of the air removed from a shock. The goal is to remove as close to 100% oxygen as possible, and it is a lengthy process if done correctly.

 

[FasterNU]

The piston seal being broken down and chunked like that is from cavitation/having air in the shocks. I had the same issue YEARS ago and reached out to a few people and learned i wasn’t properly bleeding all the air out of the shocks. Since then I’ve gotten the process down but it does suck bleeding shocks for a minimum of 30 min each lol.

Yea, makes sense. If you see my instagram post you can see how there was nothing but air for 3". The shock was barely over half full when I got the piston out... and it had that smoky vibe and emulsified shock oil. LOL. They were severely underserviced to say the least.

And yep, I have seen this also from cavitation when my shocks came apart with all the oil still in them. haha. I believe you pointed this out to me on DR. (single coil over and tight rate plate with like 300+PSI. #skywheelies)

Not speaking for Kevin, but there are a few ways to do it depending on the shock. If its a bypass shock, i'll fill the body with oil, hose clamp a plastic bag tightly around the end of the body, take it out of the vise and slowly rotate the shock vertically then back upside down to hopefully remove any bubbles in the bypass tubes. I also open and close all tubes a few times to release any trapped air. The whole process takes forever. With a coilover with resi i just keep the end cap off of the resi and cycle the IFP up and down to get most of the air out. The micro bubbles are what takes so long to get out.

This is how i do it... I fill it full and seal off end with baggie and use old oring from seal head/end cap... I also try to clock it when I turn it so the air bubble goes along the part of tube that doesnt have bypass ports. You can hear it and see the drastic volume change.

I have contemplated creating some vacuum set up with my vacuum pump I have now for AC charging.

 

[FasterNU]

The flipping method is mandatory on bypasses to bleed the air out. Coilovers you also have to cycle the ifp as well to bleed the hoses, and i also have a vacuum setup to assist with some funky shaped hoses and such BUT at the end of the day you are still submerging a piston assembly that has trapped air pockets in it. It takes awhile to pull the air fully out of the piston assembly and shim stacks, and once you get into the larger +3.5” shocks that timeline grows exponentially.

I don’t care if you are a backyard guy and just zipping through your shocks to get them back together and on the truck, what i do care about is the guys charging boatloads of cash for these services and they barely flip the shocks, pop the pistons in, and call it a day. Short of having bleed screws in the shocks to bleed off the air, i don’t think there really is a way to truly have 100% of the air removed from a shock. The goal is to remove as close to 100% oxygen as possible, and it is a lengthy process if done correctly.

yea, I was gonna say.. even if you vacuum the shit out of the shock itself... when you go trying to ram in a big piston with super stiff valving and no bleed screws open and all those cavities/etc... you are going to introduce a small amount for sure.

I do all sorts of stupid shit as it is... i fill the reservoirs with fluid and push it back through on my front coilovers because of their wacky 90 fitting set up and long hoses. I wack the sides of body with my wooden dowel to impress the voodoo dick spirits.... I also let them sit for a bit before I put the piston in.

You can tell if you got some air in there. If you pressurize to 60psi and nad compress... if you hear any bubbly noises. That's air.
Sometimes on the front CO's or bypass... I have had to do them a second time.