V,

The DIY is slightly different, w/ our AWD car as you have to deal w/ drive shaft in the middle of the front brake disc ... also the clamp that hold the bottom portion of the front shock are different between RWD & AWD, the one we use are made of steel so a lot harder to spread open.

But the rest are pretty easy, I did the spring swap project w/ my kid over the weekend and I was just using spring compressor rented from Autozone w/ no problem.

Use this DIY as its more xi specific & more suitable = https://5series.net/forums/topic/388...springs-on-xi/

GL!

PS:
When you get the front shock off the car pls take a pic of the stock & the B8 side by side for comparison.
I have a hunch the B8 will be the same height as the stock but I'm curious to see the side by side.

 

^^^^^ good point I totally blanked on the fact that his was an Xi, always good to read up on the DIY like you said so you can "supervise" the install and are not ignorant or open for them to make a mistake/pull one over on ya

 

To be honest, I can't tell very well, just after installing the springs we drove to italy (5-up with luggage...... )and drove every day, so that "accelerated" the settling.....I rekon a couple of weeks maybe? A month? I only noticed that the stupid lip started scraping more often....
I'm so cured

Not to mention that lowering springs pretty much accelerate the wear rate of standard dampers, mine are completely, and I do mean COMPLETELY shot..... :thumbsdown: (an that in 12-15.000 miles) if the car's on a ramp and you press the wheel upwards, you can move it at least 3-4 cm upwards with no effort....
I forgot to take pictures of the busted lip, but it's not that important anyways.

Have a nice evening (ok, it's evening in Germany )
Vlad

 

the only real thing that they could mess up is the filler neck to the gas tank other than that i wouldent be worried, and you should not have a problem with rubbing/scrapping with only a 1.5" drop

 

I'll be sure to take pics (from what I've read, they are 2mm shorter, 36 vs 38).

Thanks for the pointers and the DIY. My guys usually just d/l OEM manuals - they have a computer that has some type of database - or at least, that's what I remember they did last time they weren't sure about something. Either way, I want to know everything I can before going into it.

Thanks! I'll post pics of the dampers when I do the install.

That's why I decided to change the dampers. Besides, I would have needed new dampers soon anyway - mileage on the originals is pretty high.

You mean during the install?

Rubbing I'm not even remotely worried about. Scraping is another story - I don't want to compromise my car's daily drivability.

 

yes he is referring to during the install on the filler neck. Its a PITA and is in the way of removing the passenger side rear suspension assembly. If not carefull you can damage the filler neck when trying to compress/remove the shock/spring combo...

 

Will definitely keep an eye on it! Thanks for the pointers! My guys swapped the whole rear subframe for me couple of years ago - when my car got damaged in a hit and run during a huge snow storm. They did a great job back then - I took the car to the dealer after (was still under warranty), and the dealer later asked me "What dealership did I have the work done at? Everything looks great!"

Plus, this will getting done on the proper lift, so hopefully that will make it easier to get around the filler neck.

 

Question:

Is this necessary regardless of whether I'm getting alignment done after or not?