So about to turn left onto mac trail this mornin...sometime around 7:20ish...to get to the shop thats lookin at my suspension to see if its worth a damn.

Light turns green, advance starts flickering, I go.

From behind and slightly to my left I notice a big flash. I look behind to see if a ctrains coming and maybe sparked or something...no train.

So now i'm hoping to god that someone was just taking pictures with a really bright flash over at the rock gardens or something....cause otherwise I get to have some legal fun. Don't get me wrong, if I was an idiot and decided to run a red light, i'd pay it...whatever, its my fault for driving like an idiot. But if they ticket me cause their red light camera isn't calibrated right and still triggers when the light is green...that's another story.

And to top it all off today, I get in REALLY EARLY cause of my dropping off Miss Viv at the place....stop by timmys to get a bagel cause im hungry...buggers dont even bother to butter it!

CURSES!

Now just watch...later today my phone's gonna ring and Athal's friend is gonna ask me what kinda crack I'm smoking thinking my suspension has any life left in it!

raaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaawr!!!!

I'd offer to replace any of the stock components that are shot - still a good deal.

I agree, a set of stock shocks and the few other bits to bring your old suspension up to an acceptable level for the trade will be far less than buying the upgrade components

hmm now comes the question of how much the stock components set you back?

I refuse to do endlinks though. I already have beefed up ones in my KITCHEN!!!

Let see...there are at least 3 people on the board with "dealer-style" accounts at parts stores. I'm sure they can hook you up. Endlinks are cheap like Borscht for heaven's sake.

Looks like you may have to make a batch or two of cookies...did I mention that I'm an enabler (or is it just a nag? I have a hard time telling the difference sometimes )

I've seen that red light camera at 25th go off with NO one in the intersection, so I'm not surprised it took a shot of the side of your car- I wouldn't worry about it.

I was down at the shop and saw miss viv. yup, your suspension is shot as far as the mechanic is concerned.

Looks like our cost is about $140/ea for the front struts or $230 for the bilsteins. Rears start at $70 ea. You might want to check fcpgroton and ipd to compare prices. Hopefully the springs are ok, but they 're probably pretty tired with that mileage. Fronts are about $80 each, show no availability on rears.

son of a sassafrass. So, all in all, how much am I looking at here?

(is it sad that i'm not surprised my suspension is shot?)

ipd shows me around 150 for the front bilsteins. (plus shipping etc etc etc) (and thats the heavy duty expensive ones, and 90 for the rear.)

Springs I'm a little more confused at, they're lookin pricy on IPD...300ish bucks...and they seem to all be lowering springs. Now I dont know about y'all, but I'm kinda scared to lower my car for calgary roads.

What else needs doing eh lol oh god. Miss Viv, why must you scare me so?!?!?!?!

Oh and ps...I may need to borrow somebody's space for when I do the spring 'bigass detail'. I see no point in hitting up the touch up paint along spiller road adn getting DIRT and GRIME in my fresh paint...needs some time to cure. So if anyone lives on a quieter, less dirty street...I may come knocking on your door in a few months.

...how to tell I'm horribly procrastinating at work....

So yeah. Athal - i'll beat you on the dyno maybe NEXT year, this year looks like it'll be Year of the Suspension. NEXT year can be Year of the Horses.

hopefully uzzi will tell you what needs replacing, then you can get an idea of parts and how much 50% of the labour would cost.

crossin fingers....

well, as is I KNOW endlinks and strut bushings! lol ...oh god this is going to be painful.

Athal - how do I know that these components are in good shape though? I mean, just cause he's got bilstein struts doesn't mean they have lots of life left in em...(I mean, they could be as worn out as mine)

What can I say, I'm a little wary of the 'too good to be true' deals

You don't I guess. He bought the car a few months ago, and I don't think he knows when anything was changed. sufficed to say they are quality components, and I think he would know if anything needed replacing.

Not sure if you'll hear from him though, they're pretty swamped right now.

What do you think this guy is trying to get rid of, Kat? If you don't want to lower it, stick a set of new Bilsteins in your car and be done with it.

somehow i have the feeling that she's beyond a set of new bilsteins...
considering he called me and said my suspension is crap.

he didnt go into it, he was about to leave and one of the lawyers just passed me a rush...suffice to say im still at work...god bless having a spare key to the car.