[blaric]

Hi - New to the forum, I'm looking at a used 2008 Outlook but after looking under the vehicle I noticed there were no shocks inside the rear springs. Now, I'm not a mechanic but all the vehicles I've owned in the past had rear shocks inside the springs. Asked the dealer who is selling the vehicle and he said that was normal for a rear independent suspension. Is this true, or BS? Thanks. I'm planning on calling a GM dealer tomorrow for an answer without hopefully sounding stupid.

 

[rbarrios]

Just in case... heres a shot of the shocks location.
this is on my 2010 Traverse.
Its the same on the Enclave, Acadia, outlook.

In fact-- even my 2003 Trailblazer DOES NOT have the shocks within the coil spring (in the rear).

 

[blaric]

rbarrios - Thank you for the quick response and the excellent pic...I see the shock location and it is not within the spring. Thanks!

 

[rbarrios]

ahhh I thought you meant that you saw the shock- but was expecting to see it WITHIN...
thats why I posted the comment about the Trailblazers having the shocks outside of the coil....

Now I see you ran into what I ran into before...

I also had an incident where I looked from the rear and didnt see a shock... and thought WTH-- no shock?

So that got me to post on the forum about a lack of shock (And to make it worse-- no one really makes shocks for the lambdas so I really thought there was no shock)...
but upon closer personnal inspection I found the shock.

Even to this day- I think its only ACDELCO that makes the shocks. No biggy though- as I dont see too many people complaining about failed shocks.

 

[ponchonutty]

Well, I have 2 blown rear shocks and one crack rear spring. No idea how or why. I just do normal highway driving. Plan to replace them this weekend.

 

[rbarrios]

so much for not reading about bad shocks.

 

[medicrxdoc]

Thr cracked spring had been reported in 07s before, but don't remember later years. Sounds like a poor castimg of the steel used to make to spring then the extra work killed the shocks.

 

[sailfish]

Supposedly the spring on my 07 Outlook the outer covering had a pin hole in it which permitted water to penetrate to the metal and that lead to the spring breaking.

 

[ponchonutty]

Well, it actually has nothing to do about water getting under the coatings. It's more to do with cheap chinese metals that are used. Think about it, coil springs have been around for ever it seems. For years you never heard of these breaking or at least not very often. These days however it's very common. My inlaws had a very nice Rendezvous CLX AWD (basically the same basic design as our LAMBDA). They had to replace the rear shocks twice and had 3 coil springs replaced as well.

Never heard of water causing spring metal to break. If that's the case I better never wash my '70 Firebird Formula ever again since it has coil front springs. ;D