Rear Bilstein 4600 shock bushing/nut stack up?

Deja Vu…Unable to see the shaft threads to get the shock nut on the rear shock shaft with the proposed stack up below. Wondering what I’m doing wrong here.

@w666 Didn’t you say you had issues with this or maybe I’m thinking of another member?

 

I had to force the shaft up to get the threads started. We might've taken a grinder to shorten one of the rubber bushings.

 

Bolt the bottom, jack up the axle until you see all the threads

 

Do I even have enough weight with an empty bed for that to happen?

 

One of the washers should drop down to the bottom near the dust boot iirc.

 

It does not unfortunately; there’s a small lip on each shock that prevents further travel of any washer they provided. I was thinking about emailing Bilstein about it.

 

Seems you have an estra wacher in there. I recall, bottom washer facing up, rubber bushing, truck mounting hole, another rubber bushing, then the top washer facing down.

The two bushings on either side of the frame mount hole and the 2 washers on the outside of the bushings. snug down until bushing flattens almost to washer size.

 

Like zies....

 

Interesting. The stock shock shows 3 washers originally.

 

Interesting indeed. I always thought it was just like the sway bar links.

 

That's what I remember. I also remember it being a huge pain in the ass to tighten the stem nut.

 

This.

 

Yep, I pulled up the 4600 Billies on Rockauto and it shows one of the washers to have a larger diameter hole. That one should go on the bottom and should drop as assassin said.

 

You dont need a middle washer maybe im wrong, but none of my shocks have ever had one

edit- maybe im incorrect, i see a couple examples with the bushing above the mount sandwiched

 

Oh, F me. Not only do I have a bitch of a time get off the shock, but these new ones are potentially defective.

 

It should stack up just like the old one. There are two types of metal washers, the one with the nib goes in the middle. The white plastic washer on top of the blue sleeve (in your earlier photo) is only to help hold the blue sleeve in place during shipping/handling. It can be removed from your stackup to save ~ .030"...you'll need that extra room!

 

Did the bottom washer on yours go to the bottom and touch the blue dust cover or did it hang on a small lip in the middle as mine shows with about an inch of separation?

 

Should go all the way to the bottom literally touching the blue sleeve. You might have to open the hole dia. on the washer(s) to make it work.

 

I figure I can get it to work with the smallest washer on the bottom. That surprisingly seems to go over the lip. Tightening the nut should bring it closer to the 2nd washer that only goes to that lip I’ve demonstrated.

Worst case I have one rubber bushing crushed on top and the other at full height on the bottom.

 

Why not take a drill bit and widen out the washer a small bit just to have even surfaces for pressure

 

Had to look up also for my 5100s and I saved this for posting at the forum. Looks like that's where @w666's image originated.

Note one of the washers has a lip or flare around the hole, it's oriented as shown. Though I don't remember if mine had.

 

Here is my 2018
And her is my 2000 AC

 

I figure this will most likely be my stack up (minus the plastic spacer):

 

Middle washer is upside down. And I'm pretty sure bottom one closest to the shock body is supposed to be in the middle position.

But I may be wrong.

 

Pre-compression and memory retention to allow for it to fit when I’m ready to install. This is after only a 2 hour wait…

 

If you go by the pic @shifty` posted above from Bilstein, the upper and lower washers appear to be identical, with the odd one being the middle/support washer. If that's the case then your middle and lower washers are reversed.

 

The problem is that the smallest washer on the bottom is the only one with a center hole that will get to the bottom of the shaft and meet with the dust boot. The other two will catch on a lip 1/2 way down and not go further.

His pic also shows 5100 shocks, not the 4600. What I have shown should be the correct orientation.

 

Actually, that's not even from 5100. When I reached out to Bilstein it's what they told me to reference for my 5100s, and it applied to 'just about all our shocks' (not my words). But you're the one looking at the shock and the hardware, so you know better than anyone how things fit. We can only see the stack, but no lips etc.

 

That’s as far as the larger washer will go (below). It’s difficult to see where the shaft is machined to be a few mils thicker underneath.

 

The pic I posted earlier was from the 4600's I just installed. If your washers don't stack right, it might just be a tolerance problem (they're just stamped parts). Make it look like the picture. Widen the holes a hair if you need to.

PS. The upside down top washer seems odd, and made it much more hassle to wrench down the locknut...but I did it like that anyway