Aftermarket Shock Service Intervals

[1pieceatatime]

Gents -

Farting around looking at Carli and Thuren offerings and dreaming about blowing lots of money come spring, I ran across the service intervals on Fox's website: https://www.ridefox.com/service.php?m=offroad

10,000 miles for a full rebuild with a 100% highway duty cycle? Really?

Obviously it only goes down from there based on how much off-roading you do. I didn't see anything similar from King, but I'm sure it's out there.

I can't imagine the typical buyer of these shocks for an application like ours is rebuilding that frequently. I certainly can't imagine rebuilding shocks 2.5 times in 12 months for the 25k miles I pile on each year

Are you guys running Fox or King shocks seeing that sort of rebuild frequency?

[1pieceatatime]

Ha, reading comprehension fail. I guess can’t really complain about 50k rebuild on a high performance wear item.

[DamageWagon]

For performance shocks with nitrile seals that don’t get any nicks in the shock shaft and don’t see lots of mud and salt, you’re probably looking at closer to 100k miles before needing new seals and fluid and piston ring.

I’ve got almost 50k on mine with no shaft damage, no leaking, no service or disassembly. My truck has seen pretty solid use and I’ve definitely smacked the front end hard enough that I bottomed the shocks into the towers and bent the towers up a pinch.

[coder]

I have around 100k on my Kings and am a maintenance freak so I came up with this schedule on my own so it may be overkill for some. Kings hold up very well so you really don't have to do much unless there's a significant fluid leak or loss of pressure.

1) Check pressure and adjust as necessary once a year (Carli's near by and does it for free)
2) Clean with simple green once/twice a year as needed
3) Had the front shocks rebuilt by King (they're close by as well) at 60k there was a small amount of leakage but they probably didn't need it but, I did it anyway
4) Drained and refilled the fluid in all shocks at 75k (Carli did it for free while they were on the vehicle)

There's usually a small amount of oil seepage around the shaft that spreads around over time because the shaft goes in and out of the fluid with every compression stroke, it's normal and nothing to worry about. It only needs attention if it's dripping on the ground.