DIY Guide, Rear air spring replacement

[Honda]

Originally Posted by aforget

The hose could be leaking air.

Which hose?

[BDO]

Originally Posted by aforget

The hose could be leaking air.

The mechie who maintains my car says it’s either the hose, or the valve. I’m not sure which valve or what it does.
Couldn’t have happened at worse time of year. I hope driving it like this doesn’t kill the compressor.

[E90325M]

Thanks for the great BMW community.

Replaced mine with the Arnott at 75K miles (8+ years car) a coupe days ago, drove some times and it was no issue at the moment. Final height is about 32 inch with 469M wheel.

[aschmidt]

Cool stuff, also replaced 2017 with Arnott, no problems so far, regardless of angle car is parked on the driveway.

[Garth2079]

Superb write-up. Thanks, this gave me the confidence to give it a go.

I had trouble aligning the new airbags into the top slot. Eventually I realised someone could see the top of the hole from the boot (trunk) and guide me in from above. Doing it by feel wasn't working out for me but with a helper, it took a few seconds.

My OEM airbags were both fully deflated by the time the replacement Arnotts arrived from the USA to Australia (which was an exceptional 6 days for US$40). So I just pulled the fuse before the car tried to pump up the rears which saved me that parts of the job. I did have to use ISTA to inflate the new ones, but with hindsight I could have partially lowered the car so the height sensor realised they needed inflating (but not enough to squash the airbags).

Not sure if recommendations are allowed but RockAuto shipped them at a good price, low postage, and pre-billed the GST to avoid customs dramas. It's my first time order with them (I'm not affiliated or benefitting from saying this) but they are on my list of browser bookmarks for the future.

[shimmy23]

Rockauto is solid. i've bought from them many times and they're my go to right now.

[JeffZhang]

hi guys, I have a question about desiccant beads. does it have to be 1-3mm? I noticed it's hard to find 1-3mm from amazon.ca. 2-4mm is pretty popular though.