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  • Suspension top mounts

    Currently renewing my complete suspension setup.

    What make/brand top strut mounts do people reccomend?

    Also what make/brand droplinks and wishbones?

  • #2
    Strut mounts are dependant on how you like the car to feel. I have Albert's offset mounts and love them, some folk think they make the car feel a bit harsh. Certainly more precise and allow you to dial in more castor, especially if you use them in conjunction with the offset subframe mounts.
    https://www.verkline.com/shop/audi/s...h-12mm-offset/

    If not, go for a decent brand of standard mounts and get some mount saver inserts to make them last. Febi or similar.

    Droplinks: any decent brand

    Wishbone bushes: standard rubber or poly if you want more precise feel and don't mind the squeaking! Powerlex, supaflex, etc.
    Last edited by SteveH; 9 January 2020, 22:47.
    91 Modded 3B
    14 A6 Avant Black Edition

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    • #3
      What do the strut saver inserts look like and where can i buy them?

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      • #4
        Originally posted by arranstone View Post
        What do the strut saver inserts look like and where can i buy them?
        Lago Blue on here

        S2 Coupe 3B Project


        Ur quattro restoration

        S2 Avant

        Boost is the new rock and roll!
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        • #5
          I'd like to add that H&R makes some nifty camber bolts for the strut uprights.

          Could be a nice solution without having to sacrifice NVH using billet top mounts. Or combine both for that maximum attack on a track beast.

          Link:
          https://www.eurosportacc.com/product...er-bolts-tc117
          Find me on Instagram @pry4sno
          2010 Golf Sportwagen TDI /// #farmenwagen
          2002 Dodge Ram 2500 24v Cummins 4x4
          1992 80q 20v /// Eventual AAN'd Winter Sled
          1990 Cq /// Project: Because Racecar

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          • #6
            arranstone,

            From yesterday, here you go sir:

            https://www.s2forum.com/forum/techni...33#post2075433

            A quick overview re "Strut-Stops":

            http://www.classic-audi.co.uk/forum/...&postcount=635

            Clearly, you recognize that all mounts and bushings are not created equal. Please know also that both "Arm Stops" & "Strut-Stops" are really only made to work with particular dealer-sourced BOGE bushings and top-mounts; for good reasons. It will be necessary for folks to obtain these for themselves at their friendly local Audi dealer. If folks want to try them with something else, I'm sorry, I'd really rather not try to help them. Yes really. This is the only problem folks have had with these two widgets (I bring it up only because not following the simple product instructions begs the question: then why bother with them?). My aim with these two simple recipes is to make the (again particular BOGE) items they reinforce; last indefinitely. I'm really not sure how long indefinitely is yet, but to get there; I do know this - you've got to at least start with the right ingredients.

            Thank you newsh.

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            • #7
              Lago Blue I have sent you a PM

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              • #8
                Lago Blue

                When Mance was selling his MountSavers he said the requirement was either BOGE or Sachs. Are yours similarly compatible, or only BOGE?

                Thanks.
                Find me on Instagram @pry4sno
                2010 Golf Sportwagen TDI /// #farmenwagen
                2002 Dodge Ram 2500 24v Cummins 4x4
                1992 80q 20v /// Eventual AAN'd Winter Sled
                1990 Cq /// Project: Because Racecar

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                • #9
                  I have Mance MountSavers. Is there any upgrade for that?

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                  • #10
                    Dustin,

                    Yes, I do remember that too, he was actually a bit more specific than that, the problem is, just that bit is the thing most folks remember, if they remember even that or choose to abide by it. That part of what he said (and that I repeated years ago) may have been that back then, those two names possibly always got you the same part. Unfortunately, if given a choice today, as the stock BOGE dealer part is not sexy, and is perceived as being over-priced, and folks love to cross-reference and/or substitute, thinking they've got a bargain (when the real issue is they have no handy true indicator of quality or load capacity; only price) do I really want them to not pick the best mount?. If given that same choice today, folks can't but chose a lesser mount.

                    For the consumer, if not the dealer item, the what mount to choose "problem" is somewhat perplexing due to a number of factors beyond the shear number of choices available. One is what my fridge repair man calls "a product feature designed to create a service requirement" - all these mounts are designed to fail and un-aided; they all fail early. If one is hiring-out the replacement of their top-mounts, you should know more about our mounts than the garage, as they are not rewarded for getting you a more durable fix, particularly as that won't see you returning soon.

                    By my limiting Strut-Stops applicability, I better control the outcomes which I want to replicate the successes I've had.

                    Another fact that many Audi owners may not realize is that the reason there are so many inexpensive choices for top-mounts out there, is that stretching back decades and around the globe, there are millions and millions of other older lighter cars still out there (using a top-mount that "appears" interchangeable with ours) particularly on other continents where incomes are generally much less, which still today create product demand that producers are making mounts for (but whose load capacity is always way less than this one particular subject BOGE made, but Audi dealer supplied item I keep pointing to), all of those cheap mounts need to be viewed as strictly for use on much lighter smaller engined cars than ours, so know that if you're not picking this one it is likely weaker than the one you're removing. What that off-shore demand has done is absolutely flood the market with boat-loads of cheap and visually similar but inadequate for our needs mounts; because price rules.

                    So to answer your question, no, even if a well known brand, and just the Boge name by itself is also insufficient, so not just any old Boge. Strut-Stops require strictly just one particular version of BOGE top-mount (see link to ad with the P/N above) it has to be brand new and it's usually best had at the dealer. I've discussed the technical reasons ad naseum here on the forum. Some other thoughts below.

                    I don' t direct this at you Dustin (I know you know better) but to perhaps others reading here, the fact is unfortunately, just a particular favoured brand, colour, mount height or price point etc., that one may have chosen in the past likely won't get you a more durable result. None of those criteria is a particularly useful discriminator if one is seeking actual value, longer-term; and this contends that is precisely what one needs to look at. What are the mount characteristics that would deliver that?

                    Technically, here's what I want in a top-mount: near to stock, dead quiet, some comfort, a little bit of excess peak load capacity; and durability. That gets me value long term.

                    Speaking of longer term, for most of these companies, they need to keep making mounts, so the mounts therefore; need to keep failing. Readers may have noticed that despite the decades that have passed, and that these companies have had changes to their ownership and manufacturing locations, and could have changed the design, their materials and methods, but more durable mounts are not forthcoming.

                    I'll use Febi as an example here. Currently, they offer 3 different versions of top-mounts that would fit our cars, different packaging and manufacturing locations for each. Two of them have Febi's name on them. The two newest versions are cheaper than their original(!), and Febi is just code for Bilstein who choose to not put their name front and center on them. What does that tell you? It tells me Bilstein sees the opportunity at the bottom of the market. Is that the mount you fit to perhaps the world's most exclusive and sporting station-wagon, or your coupe, sedan or what have you?

                    Happily, this particular BOGE hasn't changed much over the years either (save for price). It has always been available to everyone, it is very strong (relatively, and although un-aided it would still fail, when reinforced by Strut-Stops; it hasn't yet), and surprisingly it fits the Strut-Stops perfectly, and perhaps most importantly; makes what I provide look good.

                    Unfortunately, but perhaps understandably, most of us have an almost pathological revulsion to even setting foot on Audi dealer property, let alone ever buying anything from them. So folk's learned reflex is to revert to sourcing something they think is "good enough". Despite that mounts failing early is perhaps the most oft voiced complaint across all of Audi B2, 3 & 4-dom, what then usually happens? When a couple of dealer mounts might command 90€, and other similarly shaped round black objects can be had for 9€ a pair, one can pretty much guess which choice is made most of the time, the short view or the longer one.

                    Here's the thing, any fix that is going to last, absolutely requires a mount with a demonstrated record of strength and silence over time. Now there is a discriminator that one might more intelligently go shopping with.

                    Unlike tires, which carry similar loads to mounts and are mandated to also carry load-ratings on the sidewall, top-mount makers see no requirement to provide similar, lucky for them. Lacking load-ratings for top-mounts we might then opt to choose a mount that has some history of demonstrated capability. I humbly suggest that in that regard, the particular BOGE / Strut-Stops pairing I suggest; is years into it now, therefore worth considering.

                    Keeping in mind that, as this part fails so frequently, and gets so buried under a lot of necessary, time-consuming and expensive re-work just to get properly back on the road again, our aim here ought to be to align our choice of top-mount with our need to improve this situation, to make it simply stay fixed longer; and thus allow us to be able to forget about top-mounts for a very long time; and move on to other things. Down the road, any reasonable price differential paid up front to get a top-mount that will provide the preceding, fades to insignificance in the rear-view mirror of longer periods of steady undiminished top-mount performance, much longer service intervals; and the avoided future costs of same.
                    Last edited by Lago Blue; 31 January 2020, 01:45.

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                    • #11
                      DeS,

                      After the success of his Mount-Savers, Mance produced a modified BOGE top-mount based assembly he named Pro-Mounts that required his Mount-Savers and incorporated a spherical bearing in place of the usual ball bearing. It fitted with an adapter and special nut and was very well received. You can read more here:

                      https://www.s2forum.com/forum/techni...954#post657954

                      Mance also made several versions of his Mount-Savers. Yours are likely still working fine and you are happy with them, yes?

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                      • #12
                        Mance mount saver and pro mount was for sachs boge mounts.
                        Mount were like $25 each 2 years ago, I purchased 20 of them
                        Works very well ever since.
                        sigpic

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                        • #13
                          Unfortunately, the first line in Varia's post above proves the point laid out in the 1st paragraph of post #10 above. Some clarification and my recommendation:

                          a) There may never have been a single "Sachs Boge" mount. There were Sachs mounts and there are Boge mounts, but the more important point to keep in mind firstly, is that only one particular Boge P/N was Mance's most recent recommendation through capacity testing; and there was never a Sachs P/N tested and reco'd as an equivalent to this suffix 355A Boge mount. There are reasons for all this, but I'll address that another time;

                          b) Mance's Pro-Mounts were never "for" Sachs Boge mounts, Pro-Mounts were only ever made from one particular Boge mount, never a Sachs. Again, that same 355A version Boge as above; and

                          c) The problem with repeating that old "Sachs Boge" reco like a mantra without more context is that it is not helpful to the community to perhaps leave the impression that today there are other OEM top-mounts out there worthy of our attention; if longevity is the goal. There aren't. If you find some bargain-priced old Sachs or Boge mounts out there somewhere, are they commendable, no. Currently, none are equivalent to this one particular Boge, and I certainly don't think that it is Varia's intent to imply that there are either. I don't have time this evening to go into the details, but for those seeking the toughest mount, accept substitutions at your peril. And although alone this mount is not indestructible either, the salient and my final point for now is that with some help* it is apparently working well enough for a few forum members for some time now.

                          * If this might be of interest, see links in post #6 above.

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                          • #14
                            Lago thanks for your explanation. My mount savers (with Sachs mounts) still works well, but if I find better solution I will take a chance. Pro-Mounts are available somewhere? BOGE mounts also are hard to find

                            And why old-stock OEM Boge mounts are non commendable?

                            Regards!

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                            • #15
                              Des,

                              My pleasure. Glad to hear your Sachs are holding up well for you with Mance's Mount-Savers. Years ago, there was a brief period, before the Boge 355A was introduced, when a mount labelled Sachs was thought to been made by Boge, and for a short time, this may well have been true, it's an interesting footnote. At the time Boge made a mount that was slightly weaker than their 355A, in fact looking back, they made several lesser capacity versions, all of which wore out faster than the versions that succeeded them. Sachs did similar.

                              Unfortunately, Mance's Pro-Mounts are NLA for a number of reasons, a current one being that there is only a very small and shrinking market for this kind of thing and bringing similar successfully to market is incredibly costly and time-consuming. As many folks will balk just at the cost of a proper 355A Boge at the (easy to find) Audi dealer, it's also a very hard sell to get folks to consider paying three times as much for a Pro-Mount.

                              However, another way to look at the kind of benefit that superior mounts, bushings and similar mods imbue our cars with, which is often over-looked is as follows. At this point, we persevere with these cars because kept up, which is challenging and instructive, they are tremendous fun to drive. If one examines what are the physical parts of the car from which the attractive driving characteristics are drawn, the best possible condition of all the joints which attach and guide its' "flight controls" and transmit signal to and from us and the road, has to be near the top of that list. Much else is just posing.

                              So, some reasons why old-stock joints of any make may not be worth pursuing are, for starters the rubber is already years (perhaps decades?) older, the designed in durability and peak load capacity will be less than current best ones to start with and the involved time and expense of the repair is undermined by starting with known inferior parts. Not only will they physically fail faster, but right from the start and all along the way, the car will feel less pleasurable to drive, and get that way; more quickly. One might ask, what are the savings in doing a repair with parts known to be less than the originals; and what is the cost? The latest top-mounts, having been made for the heaviest V6 cars, are going to provide the most peak vertical load capacity, making them better able to survive (particularly with your Mount-Savers) the literally otherwise explosive impact mounts experience on the far side of a pot-hole taken at speed, and therefore also more likely to preserve the mount's more modest but essential stock as new lateral resilience, which is necessary for braking and steering; everyday.

                              Further, (although I know nothing about the condition of your particular car) consider that if you like what Mount-Savers have provided for your top-mounts, even if an upgrade for them was available, it may be that similar balanced attention to everything between and including the steering column flex-coupling to the A-arm bushings would be in order and perhaps more cost effective; first. To that end may I humbly suggest Arm-Stops.

                              Finally, to your last question, we can through our choosing, enjoy the result of making repairs that are better (in terms of the driving experience, required service intervals and long-term costs) than they were originally when the car was new. I find such quite satisfying.


                              Last edited by Lago Blue; 1 March 2020, 18:26.

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