Struts- Bare or Assembly?

Adieu do you have the Ranchos on your Expedition if so how do you like them and did you do the back at the same time because I don't want the front to be higher than the back.

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tpndrcn

What a difference a bay makes! The bay, that is, in which my mechanic replaced my dead original struts with KYB Excel-G struts using my coils and hardware. It only took a few miles to learn that I had been driving a veritable buckboard for at least two years. No more teeth jarring, bronco busting, dolphin leaping, alligator-rolling trips in my truck for me. The difference is literally unbelievable! Even the engine and transmission seem to be running more smoothly as if in appreciation for no longer being rattled to death every time I hit the smallest rut, manhole cover, speed-bump, pothole, etc. Moreover, the truck is quicker out of the hole because the struts brought it back to its original ride height and weight distribution so it no longer feels like it has a load in its pants. So if you have the ability to get the old struts off and compress springs I can recommend KYB Excel-G struts #340071 front and #340072 rear. My advice to the Gen 3 community is regardless which replacement struts or coil-overs you choose, do it if your truck manifests any of the aforementioned buckboard-behavior or if your mechanic tells you your struts are leaking (the advice I ignored for two years as mentioned above) and fall in love with your Gen 3 expy again!

Ztruke thanks for the recommendation. I know the feeling ,my struts are clunky and taking away from my better ride that I could have with replacement struts. I just need to make a decision already and order some

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tprdrcn
Happy to help. I'd be interested in hearing the results of your search.

I replaced all 4 assemblies on my 2008 Expedition 2WD earlier this year at 86K miles. I researched this topic extensively and ended up going with the Monroe QuickStruts...ordered them on rockauto.com (best price around, even with shipping) and installed them myself. I am pretty mechanically inclined but this was my first time doing any suspension work and didn't find the job to be too difficult. The rears were a little harder than the fronts, mostly because it took some maneuvering to get the bottom of the rear struts out of the control arms, then keeping the bottom of the new ones at the right position while I installed the lower strut bolt took some time, but all in all it wasn't too bad...took me about 7 hours total (1.5 hour per side in the front, 2 hours per side in the back), which I didn't think was too bad considering it was my first time. If I had to do over again, I'd go with the Rancho QuickLift assemblies to get a little bit of lift, but have been happy with the ride quality of the Monroes (still riding well 15K miles later), and they did lift up my truck a little bit (it was sitting low due to the old worn shocks). Either way, I'd recommend going with the assemblies vs. messing with compressing the springs to get the new shocks in, then risk the bushings or other plastic parts being damaged or worn, etc., as I've heard to be a problem with our trucks.

Greg S I took some measurements of my front and rear wheel wells from top of the tire to underside of the well and from the ground to the bottom of the well and I only have 1/8" difference in height from front to back. My fear of going to Ranchos would be taking the front higher than the rear , because I don't plan on doing the rear struts right now. So most likely I am going to go with the Monroe Quickstruts like you but I will keep you and everyone else updated. Thanks for the recommendation

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tpndrcn said:

Greg S I took some measurements of my front and rear wheel wells from top of the tire to underside of the well and from the ground to the bottom of the well and I only have 1/8" difference in height from front to back. My fear of going to Ranchos would be taking the front higher than the rear , because I don't plan on doing the rear struts right now. So most likely I am going to go with the Monroe Quickstruts like you but I will keep you and everyone else updated. Thanks for the recommendation

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I finally got around to installing some new struts on my 2010 Expy. After lots of feedback (Thank you all)and internet browsing I decided to go with Bilstein struts. I installed them last Saturday. Everything went smoothly as far as installation goes. I removed the brakes, upper and lower ball joints from the hub assembly, tie rod from hub assembly, and unbolted the bottom nut on the sway bar links. After unbolting the struts top and bottom I then pushed down on the lower control arm and removed the struts. I had previously borrowed an O.T.C strut spring compressor from a co-worker and used it to swap out both struts. This consisted of compressing the springs, removing the upper strut nut, removing the old strut from the spring assembly, swapping over the spring perch and bump stop from the old struts, installing a new steel spacer on the strut shaft(supplied from Bilstein) , and finally bolting the new struts in the spring assembly with the new nuts also supplied from Bilstein. I then proceeded to replace both CV axles and axle seals (Carquest axle asseblies and Tiemken seals) due to both inner boots being torn for quite some time and one seal leaking slowly. After that I reinstalled the struts in the reverse order.

Overall the job went fairly smooth , however this is not my first attempt by any means doing something like this. I was previously a Ford technician. On a scale of 1-10 for those to attempt it yourself I would say 8-9 just because of the amount of tools required and the danger involved with compressing strut springs.

As far as the ride goes I don't notice it being amazingly better yet with only 100 miles on them, however it it did fix my steering wheel shimmy at higher speeds and I would say I do notice some slightly increased handling characteristics. I had 123,000 miles on what I believe are the original struts so not a bad run over all for Motorcraft parts. Hopefully this helps anyone who may be considering new struts for thier 3rd gen.

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tpndrcn said:

Adieu do you have the Ranchos on your Expedition if so how do you like them and did you do the back at the same time because I don't want the front to be higher than the back.

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Front & back Rancho assemblies.

Pretty decent, although I find the lower range of the settings to be utterly useless & the adjustment knobs very prone to binding and difficult to turn...

Improved stability and handling, seems like even braking and acceleration benefited from the stability. Still figuring out the settings for optimal comfort though.

have a bit of a side to side sway issue on certain rough roads, but suspect that's a sway bar issue and not the coilovers themselves

ExpeditionAndy said:

If the price is acceptable fully assembled beats having to compress spring and deal with that mess.

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Just beware for those who have an EL... no assembled struts are made for them unless you buy those that are meant to replace the air suspension.

Had to replace rear shocks and did much looking and almost had a Tires plus throw in a pair of monroe. Checked with monroe and they said they are not to be used with the EL due to extra weight and size of rear spring.

Decided to go with Bilstein and order two on internet...got two boxes with correct rear shock part number but actually had a front one in one of them. Had to settle on Monroe Reflex due to only one available in real time while truck was in air at the shop! Not too happy with them though...too much bounce.

I got a set of completes off Amazon during a Monroe promotion and had the dealer put them on for me. They ride better than OEMs!