[PhaseP]

Internals of my cut and taken apart old front strut and rear shock.

Interesting is the internal coil spring on the front strut. It limits and resists the full extension of the piston rod. This gives trouble with spring compression when assembling/disassembling. Either have to fully compress the springs, or somehow extend and hold the piston rod against the force of that inner spring. It may be an XI feature only. My replacement Billstein B4's didn't have these, they were fully extending by themselves.

Also there is no difference (with the exception of that inner spring) between the struts and the shocks, other than substantially thicker outer tube wall, and thicker piston rod of the strut.

I didn't notice any wear on the shock internals, and they had not leaked yet. But they were a lot easy to move in and out than the replacements. I think they had started loosing the gas fill, and oil in them may be foaming during use due to this. They were extending rather slowly when let go.

I was hearing a lot of hissing sound over bumps. Replacement Billstein B4's so far free of this sound.