Originally Posted by CaptainKirk2016

I told my wife I am seriously considering offering to do air suspension repairs, along with the full array of fluids, and regular maintenance amongst other things for MB and BMW owners. I've caught the dealers pulling ****, I've caught the sole proprietors red-faced, red-handed not doing it the right way, And now I do it all myself. I am now sporting the quietest car - it's back to the way it was originally. I have also cracked the code on the rear shocks. Also, wait until you do what I did and literally go through alignments in the teens, can't recall for sure but it was over 14 alignments only to find out they were not trained in setting caster! Had two shops try to tell me my chassis was bent - car has never had any bent sheet metal. Went to two frame shops because I was beginning to wonder. Even one of the OEM MB dealers here couldn't adjust the castor! THIS IS NOT FICTION. I was going CRAZY. You guys want a quiet ride, send your car to me, ha! I've bought so many parts from the dealer, I am getting a discount on OEM parts. The Bilstiens are probably a great alternative but until I hear someone say they don't thunk, I won't use them. FCP Euro is a great resource, but one must have the tools. I've two lifts in my garage, and I just went through this with an E550 Sedan with the Sport package and he is over the top happy! Getting ready to do his serpentine, thermostat, oil cooler gasket, and all of the fluids. I bought all of the equipment because I got tired of my car coming home with "production shop" damage to my wheels, interior, etc. The Dealers don't know what many of us have learned because they don't generally see the older cars. I call the OEM Dealers a 1st tier owner production repair shop, maybe a 2nd tier owner repair shop if there was an extended warranty. That leaves the knucklehead shops. I can tell you stories. My wife's HID system went to the dealer time after time for dim HID's. After I cracked open the $1200 headlight assembly by baking it in the oven and detaching the clear lense, I found this: if you self-select HID's to also be your daytime running lights via the dash options, turns out you will burn the reflective coating off of the projector reflector! They turned up the voltage, replaced the bulbs, and I bought brighter bulbs. Driving it at night was nearly blind driving. When I showed them, they had no idea HID's would do that to the projector - the voltage and everything else was working perfectly, the reflector just had 100K miles of always being on and it finally burned through all of the metal coating on the reflector. Just one example. If you get your front end sorted, be advised, the rear shock absorbers will also knock. They'll perform damping and rebound just fine, but when they have just a tiny bit of fluid evaporate out of them, they will thunk and make you think the shock absorber is loose at the tower in the trunk. Not the case.

Originally Posted by wprimeau

Kirk, I am replacing my front Arnott air struts and my rear original air springs with all Bilstein components. What is the method you devised to remove the reservoirs attached to the rear air springs without removing the subframe? Thank you.

Originally Posted by Jerseyjules

I belive most people just deflate them by puncturing them. The new ones come deflated enough to fit in.