Shock Absorbers

Hi,
OKA 295 asking advice on good robust shocks to fit. Any experience on better brands, price and availability

Thanks


Rainer

317 has been running Tough Dogs for the last seven years. Still good.

Thanks

Are they ex USA or available here?

The original Monroes are quite good and rarely fail (except for the rubbers). The OKA has very long springs which act as a damper as do the Aeon rubbers so the shockers have a relatively easy life particularly when compared to a coil sprung vehicle where the springs give no dampening effect at all.
Unless you have a known issue with your shocks they may be OK. What is more common on OKA's is for the springs to soften and sag with age and the horrible erkot fibrous bushes to fail.

Deano

Rainer, Tough Dogs are available in Oz from 4WD1.com , but are very big and expensive.

I find they are not long enough and often and bang on bouncy tracks when they reach their ends stops and the front axle is suddenly pulled upwards. Probably the cause of a shock absorber mount failure.

Next time I'll probably return to Munroes and double them up as necessary.

horrible erkot fibrous bushes ????

Where are these?

On 164 they were in the chassis mount of the hanger (and maybe in the rear eye of the spring too). The front eye bushes on 164 were a bi-metal arrangement, as were the new ones that went in everywhere when I changed to 1" pins.

Thanks for the info

Rainer, have a look at this topic begun a few years ago too, for more information...

www.oka4wd.com/september-2012/15-shock-a...s-recommendations#19

Thanks Hal

I had one original shock develop a very slight leak so replaced them all with the same brand and type simply because there was no reason to go for anything (supposedly) better.

5.7 tonnes and only one shock on each corner. Any time I check how warm they are getting - and I do it quite often on roads like Gunbarrel and CSR - they are never more than warm which indicates to me that the combination of lowering tyre pressure and slowing down is probably more important than fitting exotic shocks and driving to the max.

Tony
Being new to the OKA geometry of the suspension I questioned weather the travel on the shocks would generate excessive heat and premature wear on tracks such as CSR. I have traveled extensively in land cruisers all over the country and on several occasions suffered failed shocks from fatigue. I am preparing for several trips as a support vehicle for rally and safari events and just want to ensure we do not become the vehicle needing supporting
Rainer

Two main approaches to the CSR - the one used by the Merc 4WD team that were going to be the first factory team to conquer the CSR - and a variant used by two high-end 4WDs towing high-end Kimberly Campers equipped with RACING SHOCKS, as they bragged when I suggested (as they asked us to get off the road so they could get past) their method of avoiding corrugations by only touching down on every tenth peak would bring them unstuck, but that I would be happy to tootle along behind picking up the pieces. We caught them up the next day at well 33 and relaxed watching one of them spend hours and several hacksaw blades making up brackets to hold their rig together. (I must admit to forgetting about all the tools I carried which would have made their all-day job somewhat shorter. Must have been due to the excitement of wondering how many strokes of the hackesaw he would get before that characteristic twang and a hearty curse)

The other method is to be the one who tootles along in a 20 year old vehicle at a steady speed and gets over every dune (on the CSR at least) without a run-up or stopping and without a factory support team or media pack and without a breakdown.

Your problem will be to resist the urge imposed by being surrounded by hoards of "hoons" who are either not paying the bills themselves, or who have enough resources to be easily able to afford them. Having to keep to any sort of timetable will probably make it a lot harder. The other big problem will be driving a vehicle that really has nothing to prove, but which would be seen as having a reputation to maintain. If you have to drive hard and fast then I imagine the only way to avoid problems is either to throw a lot of money into buying the best shocks available and/or carry a few spare ones.

Official advice for getting over the CSR in one piece is to let the tyres down and drive to conditions and carry spare shocks, none of which the Mercedes team heeded.

Did you read the advice on the Beadell Tour company site regarding tyres and shocks

Tony Lee wrote: Two main approaches to the CSR - the one used by the Merc 4WD team that were going to be the first factory team to conquer the CSR - and a variant used by two high-end 4WDs towing high-end Kimberly Campers equipped with RACING SHOCKS, as they bragged when I suggested (as they asked us to get off the road so they could get past) their method of avoiding corrugations by only touching down on every tenth peak would bring them unstuck, but that I would be happy to tootle along behind picking up the pieces...
...
Did you read the advice on the Beadell Tour company site regarding tyres and shocks

Tony,
Can you quantify your speed and the Merc speeds?
Running on the Great central, it seemed like it was happy at ~90kph, but in maybe 3-4" high correlations there was encouragement to slow down to 60kph.
Basically how does one determine what speed to travel? ( shakes like a dog at 10-30+ thenseems better at 50+... how do I (does one) make a determination?

Interestingly the red dust seemed to be worse, and the white patches smoother. Also the direction of travel seemed to make a difference on the corregations. I am not sure if that was due to the road being closed on the western end side side for a while, so maybe the delivery trucks were less loaded on the way back towards Yulara? Or maybe more west-to-east traffic?
I dunno... what would cause it?

When I bought mine about 14 years ago it came with Koni shocks. Last year I took them off and had them tested at Koni. 2 out of 8 were sad which were made into 1 good one and I purchased a new one. Not bad for all those years and corregations.
Expensive initially but over a long time works out reasonably.
Peter

Peter Davis wrote: When I bought mine about 14 years ago it came with Koni shocks. Last year I took them off and had them tested at Koni. 2 out of 8 were sad which were made into 1 good one and I purchased a new one. Not bad for all those years and corregations.
Expensive initially but over a long time works out reasonably.
Peter

What's-the-model-#?
Where-didja-getum?

Is that better than getting Monroes every few years?
Or...
Is the ride better in some way?

Merc speeds on the CSR - no idea, but given a ego of drivers with expensive vehicles backed up by a full support team trying to prove that Mercs were going to conquer not only the world but the CSR as well, you could easily imagine that slowing down wasn't part of their driving instructions. It was pretty well publicised at the time so bound to be plenty of info available to a google search. I'd say their average start to finish speeds might have been less than ours so a classic tale of tortoise and hare. Not sure how anyone manages to abuse shock absorbers to the point where they literally break in halves.
You will find journalistic gems such as

It’s a pretty audacious task: pitting a bunch of brand-new, unmodified vehicles against probably the most gruelling off-road track in Australia, and one of the toughest in the world: the Canning Stock Route.

Funny that Betty and I really enjoyed the trip to the extent that we will probably do it again. Guess the text should have read something more like it being crazy to let a team of inexperienced dickheads loose on the CSR without giving them some clues first..

Between Wells 25 and 26 are some of the biggest sand dunes on the track, and while not up to Simpson Desert standards, they still require plenty of revs and locked centre and rear diffs before blasting over the top.

You can see a movie at mr4x4.com.au/remember-mercedes-benz-took-canning-stock-route/ that details their stupidity. 20 grand aircraft charter to get more spares, technicians to fix their mistakes, vehicles driving at speed 20 metres apart etc etc. At around 2 minutes they are showing off driving at 60kmph on corrugations

Our speeds?? Obviously slow enough that our standard OEM shocks survived without breaking into a sweat. Pretty much every time we stopped for coffee, I felt the shock absorber and they were always barely warm. I figured that was as good an indication as any. The other problem with driving the tops of the corrugations is the CSR has very little straight track so going around corners on the tops of corrugations wasn't very safe or smart.

With respect to the dual shock tower and dual leaf shack shock/damper mounts...

Does anyone have the flange to flange distance between the damper mounting points?
(I am estimating ~6-3/4" ~170-mm - but a good dimension would be better to know)

I am talking about an XT - but an LT should be the same??

Hi Holmz,
I will get you the info with photo in the comming days.
Martyn

mort wrote: Hi Holmz,
I will get you the info with photo in the comming days.
Martyn

On a totally related note...
I have read that the OKA is good on dampers as the springs do some damping. But I am not sure if that is compression, rebound, or both ways.
And I have also read that dual dampers are worthwhile, and that they may over dampen.
And also that the monroes last a long time.

Should I put much stock I the idea of dual dampers?
Or is it more about tyre pressure for smoothness on corragations?
Should I be considering twins or singles? Or mixed?

(~2.5t on the front, and about 2t on the rear axel.)