Az scooter

ShawnInPaso

Well I'm back with a big "WTF" look on my face.

This afternoon I set out to do some of the simple tests shared with me in this thread, I pulled the Jeep out of the garage and figured I'd start with the easy 'jump on the bumper' test. Actually I just pushed hard on the right side of the bumper, then the left. Every time I pushed on the bumper I could hear some odd noises, almost like something rubbing against a loose part? The front end had an obvious "bounce", way more than should happen. Anyway, I gave it one last big push on the center of the bumper and the noise went away? Curiously I looked around at each shock, and to my dismay, this is what I found.

Did I say WTF already?



Left front shock


Right front shock

Mr.T

The nut is there, but the upper cupped washers are missing and the rubber bushing sheared off! How long ago were those shocks installed? Amazing!

Edit: I'm going to look in the shop -- May have an extra pair of washers and upper rubber bushings... Yep, PM if you don't have them.

resharp001

Nah, all I see there are MOPAR's invisible shock extensions. Pretty amazing.....

So the shock body is down....and in the picture, those shocks are fully compressed with zero resistance? Toast.

Is the right spring really bowed that much, or is that maybe an optical illusion in the picture?

Mr.T

I better get my eyes checked -- Good observation!

resharp001

Well, on the bright side.....that happened while in your driveway and not while driving on the road or out and about on a wheelin trip. Geesh....see something new every day.

ShawnInPaso

Hey Mr. T -

The shocks were installed by a dealer in 2011 when the Jeep was new (I bought it used with 7k miles on it in late 2012). That's mighty generous of you to offer up the washers and bushings. I'm thinking about new shocks after this, but I'll sure let you know. I'm wondering if the shocks may have been under sized for the lift and consequently finally gave up after being over extended).

ShawnInPaso

Hah - invisible indeed!

I think the image is skewed a bit, I'll have to look again in the morning though.

ShawnInPaso

And I was just out on a trip to a remote area in our county doing some rather vertical stuff on sketchy dirt roads. All that bouncing would have been a disaster.

Mr.T

Rubber and washers are here if you need them. Resharp's observation that the shocks are collapsed likely means they are bad, the only other possibility being that they are old fashioned non-pressurized hydro shocks. You might check the rears and see if they fully extend on their own.

The shocks almost certainly were designed to support the axle weight and spring force at full extension, don't think that could be the problem. Looks to me like what happened is that the top washers were not installed -- Which look similar to the ones on the bottom, and "sandwich" the rubber bushings. Without the force distributed over the washer it wore/sheared the upper rubber bushing.