fenlander wrote:

Same story with mine so both front struts getting replaced Monday all being well.

I'm beginning to wonder whether FFRRs have some devilish built-in expiry timers on key components!

The temperature factor makes sense and to be fair to JLR/Dunlop, the struts removed from mine have a 2002 date stamp so may be the original factory units, so 18 years and 128k miles is not so bad after all!

Just on the Island4x4 subject, they do need to both package their products better and maybe use a different courier than DPD as the LH strut that arrived (very promptly) from them was bashed about and had a brass nipple smashed so neither use nor ornament!

Fortunately I'd read their Ts&Cs and signed for the parts as "unchecked" so when my mechanic spotted the problem there is a record for Island4x4 to argue the toss with DPD, otherwise a couple of hundred notes up the swanny!

Hmmm, I thought mine were pretty well boxed up and surrounded by bits of packaging material, but it was still DPD - maybe I was lucky!

I think you were lucky, mine arrived in a flimsy thin walled cardboard box with a couple of bog roll tubes over the black metal sidearms and a piece of tissue paper laid on top - the entire strut was able to rattle around and rotate inside the box so much so that the top studs had indented the cardboard box end as well as breaking the brass nipple off, all it would have taken to avoid this problem is for the box to have been opened before shipment and filled with some extra packing but this didn't happen.

Due to the rubber bag etc, these items are actually quite fragile in transit, ironic when you consider the job they do in service!

Still waiting for Island4x4 to get back to me to arrange collection of damaged strut and a full refund, hopefully will get this resolved today...

How is anyone getting on with this problem of ours? My car was booked into the garage yesterday but they told me it'd be next week before they could look at it. 2010 FF 4.4 TDV8 Vogue - Gone
2007 FF VSE 3.6 TDV8 - Gone
2011 RRS HSE 3.0 TDV6- Gone
2003 FF TD6 Vogue - Gone
2006 FF TD6 - Gone
2007 FF 3.6 VSE - For sale
2011 FF 4.4 TDV8 - Current

Got two new front struts fitted to mine last week and so far all good... if that's what you mean?

I did my struts last weekend, and very happy it's stayed fully inflated all week as it always used to, without being used since Sunday.

Having received the replacement plastic clips yesterday for one of the sensor wires that goes round the strut, if I get a chance this weekend I'll hopefully just pop those onto the new struts to finish the job completely.

Quote:

to be fair to JLR/Dunlop

Original Struts/Airbags were not Dunlop, they were Delphi

Looks like Island 4x4 do BWI, which is part of Delphi .
Experience is the only genuine knowledge, but as time passes, I have forgotten more than I can remember
Volvo V70 P2 2006 2.4 Petrol 170bhp Estate SE
MG Midget Mk1 1962

Previous: L322 Range Rover TDV8 3.6 2008; L322 Range Rover TD6 3.0 2002; P38A Range Rover V8 1999

My RR lay at the garage untouched for 2 weeks .. it lay about for a week before I took it to them, so it was booked in to lay about.. why do garages do that? If they said 'it'll be three weeks before we can even put it on the ramp' then i'd have gone elsewhere...

The height is.. ordered new Delphi front air strut and a new ride height level sensor for the rear, I'm going to replace both sensors/sides.
It should be back in the room by Friday. 2010 FF 4.4 TDV8 Vogue - Gone
2007 FF VSE 3.6 TDV8 - Gone
2011 RRS HSE 3.0 TDV6- Gone
2003 FF TD6 Vogue - Gone
2006 FF TD6 - Gone
2007 FF 3.6 VSE - For sale
2011 FF 4.4 TDV8 - Current

Is there anything you can do to the airbags to extend their life? Some sort of spray that aids how supple they are and helps stop them from cracking?

I had one front bag burst (passenger side) on my 2003 L322, it had covered about 110k miles at the time. Got a feeling mine dropped at the front only, so the other (good) front one must of exhausted somewhere as it was left looking like a dragster.

I replaced both complete front units/assemblies from Island4x4, I think about £230 each. PITA to get the old ones out as a few bolts had siezed/rusted on.

could be a faulty ride height sensor (at a guess only though) or a slow leak? Can you raise it to off road height and spray some leak finder over the bags?

M@r]{ wrote:

Is there anything you can do to the airbags to extend their life? Some sort of spray that aids how supple they are and helps stop them from cracking?

Just done the front on my 2004 vogue...about 3 hours a side....yes i know there are videos on youtube that show it bering done faster...they lie !

The knuckle bolts were absoloute horrors to get out...in the end i reverted to shielding what i could with a biscuit tin lid then hit them with a propane torch and still pigs to get out requiring a breaker bar and a 3 foot extension just to get them to move.

I diagnosed a tear in my pass side by raising it to fording height and sticking my head in the wheel well....pretty obvious when all i could hear was pssssssssssssssss

£250 quid a pair delivered off the bay of evil

Couple of axle stands a trolley jack and a bottle jack worked well and gave me a welcome helping hand when installing the new ones

Just had them replaced(2x front),no warnings anymore on dash...but still overnight front right goes down. Does it need to be calibrated or i still have a leak?

paulbrown22 wrote:

Mine were for a 2011 5.0 S/C with Adaptive Dynamics, if you are the 2007 TDV8 listed in your profile then you get to use the cheaper struts without the Adaptive bit . The actual air bags are the same for both though.

You can choose to remove the existing strut, remove and replace just the airbag part, and then refit the strut. Or you can buy complete new struts with the air bag ready fitted. I chose the latter, obviously more expensive, especially with the Adaptive bit, but given this is my main car I didn't want to be doing the job again. Some people on here have had good success just doing the air bags, but I had more comments (including several LR specialists) suggesting replacing the complete strut is generally far more reliable, so I went down that route.

I used Island 4x4 for all my parts (and they arrived ~20 hours after ordering!). If you just email them with your VIN, they'll make sure you get the right stuff.

From a quick look, seems you would probably want:

LH complete strut: https://www.island-4x4.co.uk/spring-strut-...-6698.html
RH complete strut: https://www.island-4x4.co.uk/spring-strut-...-6699.html

Or just bags:

LH bag: https://www.island-4x4.co.uk/spring-front-...34328.html
RH bag: https://www.island-4x4.co.uk/spring-front-...30687.html

I also bought 4 new knuckle bolts and buts, as several people commented either the threads on the old ones were knackered, or they had to cut them off. Mine seemed to be okay, but I replaced anyway having bought them:

Genuine bolt: https://www.island-4x4.co.uk/bolt-suspensi...-9805.html
Nut: https://www.island-4x4.co.uk/front-suspens...-9806.html

Did you replace the whole strut or just the bag? If it does inflate normally at start up, and then sinks overnight, that suggests a leak somewhere to me. What happens if you lift up into off-road mode - can you hear any air escaping then?

I don't think I did any explicit recalibration of mine - once they were fitted and I switched on the engine, they all just inflated quite happily/normally and have behaved absolutely normally now for the past ~3 years.

I have seen several people who just replaced the bags on existing struts not quite get them sealed properly, and still have leaks afterwards. Or potentially maybe if the airline hasn't been correctly connected to the strut - that was quite a fiddly connection given the limited working area, and the nasty plastic threads could get chewed up if not put in perfectly straight.