Bilstein 7100 - oil quantities?

[craig]

I'm attempting to rebuild my 7100 following the Bilstein rebuild guide. Everything was going fine until I tried to refill them with oil. The instructions appear to be innacurrate including the example.

- As I understand it, the rebuild guide states that I should put in 700ml total on a 10" external reservoir shock. Putting 200ml into the external reservoir, then the remaining 500ml into the shock body.

I'm finding that I can only fit 100ml into the external reservoir (almost 200ml w/ the hose full) and only 550ml total. That's an overflowing shock shock body.

Am I on crack or are these numbers bad?

Thanks for the help.

Craig

 

[craig]

After talking to Larry on the phone this morning, I now realize I had the piston inside the external reservoir set to the wrong depth. I misunderstood which piston the directions were talking about (reservoir piston vs shock piston).

Thanks Larry.

Craig

 

[flyfisher11]

After talking to Larry on the phone this morning, I now realize I had the piston inside the external reservoir set to the wrong depth. I misunderstood which piston the directions were talking about (reservoir piston vs shock piston).

Thanks Larry.

Craig

I just had the same problem Craig. How did you move the res piston? I couldn't get mine to move any further. I might have left this shock empty for too long. It was a spare that blew a line about a year ago and I just got around to attempting to service it. I removed the valve stem completely and tried to push the piston down further but no budging. I put as much oil in it as I could and will attempt it again soon.

Cheers,

Mike

 

[craig]

I removed the valve stem from the schraeder valve and remove the hose from the top of the reservoir. My solutions seem kinda ghetto, but I found that you can move the piston a few different ways.

- Remove the hose, and stick a long screw driver in there (or preferably something with a blunt end). This is how I pushed the piston to the bottom of the reservoir to make room for the oil.

- Stick a clothes hanger through the schraeder valve (with the stem removed). This works to set the 100mm depth, but isn't necessary as you can....

- Just push on it from the bottom of the reservoir (opposite the end where the hose connects) with your fingers. This is what I wound up doing to bleed them.

My overall process was to:
- Push the piston to the bottom of the reservoir
- Fill the reservoir with 200ml of oil.
- Re-attach to the reservoir to the shock body.
- Put little oil in the shock.
- Put the shock piston in, and pushed it down to just below the oil line.
- Added the rest of the oil.
- Pushed on the bottom of the reservoir to bleed the air out of the shock. Not suprisingly, it went in about 100mm until the oil was just below the inner snap ring.
- Moved the shock piston up/down a little to insure that there wasn't any air trapped on the other side of the shock piston
- Closed it all up, compressed the shock which pushed the reservoir piston back out to the bottom.
- Re-installed it in the truck.
- Ready to get filled with nitrogen

Craig


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