Just curious as to what the typical life expectancy is of shock absorbers on modern day cars. I know a lot of it would depend on how much abuse they are subjected to but just assuming they are only exposed to average daily driving with no extraordinary punishment, what would be a realistic lifespan to expect from shock absorbers, particularly the shocks installed at the factory?

Most cars run 'struts' all around, mostly only trucks still run a shock absorber of some sort..Same idea however, last car we had was a '00 taurus, 86,000 on the factory stuts..were holding up fine. But I have seen cars from up north with 40,000 and you could get motion sick driving (VW).

I am flat out amazed that the Edelbrock IAS shocks on my 1995 Ram 4x2 have lasted over 120,000 miles and still work pretty well. The red powder coat is still in good shape too.

I changed mine out when they were 41 years old.

Sheldon

I think I remember reading some shock industry material that suggested replacing parts in the 25-40K mile range. I've had some Gabriel Terrain-Tamer shocks last well over 60K miles and have plenty of pressure and damping left in them. I've also had OEM replacement (read: Mopar from the dealer) struts last MAYBE 10K miles before they were outright flacid. Same can be said for some Bilstein HD struts that replaced the Mopar units... maybe 20K out of them tops. It's not just Mopar parts that suffer, either. I have a set of OEM shocks/struts from a relatively low-mileage 2008 Honda Fit, and the damping is inconsistent between the pairs already. KYB supplies thes shocks/struts.

In the end, you may get lucky and get a bunch of miles out of a set, but you really have to keep your eye on them and stay tuned in to how they're working. Unless they die a tragic death, you may just get used to the gradual decrease in performance and one day you realize you're driving a wallowing pig...

Clair

so...? 200K is too much? dan

ask an autocrosser this question!