DDK - Die Deutschen Klassiker

Ian Donkin wrote:James

Undo the top nut and remove the strut to reveal all....

Bear in mind if you do this and it doesnt already have an insert in it ie its the original shock it will be ruined and need replacing as you will have broke the seal. The original isnt a seperate self sealed unit link the new inserts.

From the pic you just posted it looks like the pre 85 Boge with the aluminium lock, the later ones have a steel lock that screws onto the outside of the strut not the inside. Its a shame as I chucked out a set of these a few weeks back otherwise I could have taken some pics for you to compare to.

Steve

thanks Steve

Thats the info I was after

James if you have the originals inside be carefull when dissassembling, its probably best to totaly remove the strut from the car rather than leaving the bottom connected. On the originals the outer strut forms part of the workings and is full of mineral oil this is really nasty stuff and stinks horrid gave me a bad headach when I did mine. The main problem is you obviously need to empty the strut of its old oil before the new insert can go in much easier if you have the whole thing off as you can just tip it out.

Heres what the original's look like



Steve

bit of an update:


Struts are deffo Boge.

I removed the top nut using a the jaws of a welding clamp ( this worked really well for me)



As Steve mentioned , the internals of my struts turned out to be stock Boge



Looking at the one I have disassembled so far it seems to be full of stone or something !






Anyway, I now know what struts I have & I have new Bilstein inserts ready to fit Just need to find a tool to use to tighten up the new nut supplied with the inserts

I'm reluctant to completly remove the strut , so I'm thinking of ways to drain out all the oil thats left in the strut. I might use a syringe method to suck out the oil.

The car is now sat waiting for me to get time to install the struts. I'll start a new thread on this