Suspension change.

What sort of job is it to cange the springs and dampers on a C4? I'm pretty handy with spanners but haven't had to do this before,the front looks pretty straightforward but how do you get to the rear upper mounts?

You can see the rear shocker mounts in the photos on this thread: http://www.porscheclubgbforum.com/tm.asp?m=612019 No doubt Steve will be along with some helpful hints.

That's the ones Just pop the carpet up. One tip I can offer is always try to compress the springs under the arch a little and then undo the centre nut of the shock whilst it's on the car, if can sometimes be a real pain to try and break the nut loose with the strut off of the car whilst keeping the strut still and not dropping it or bashing it into something when applying torque to the nut (have learnt this from previous cars). The backs just pretty much drop out, so nice and easy, no disconnecting stuff and tilting the hub away risking popping the drive shaft out and dumping your oil (as I have also done before on other cars lol, thankfully not this one!). I put one compressor either side, but it was a little tricky, as theres a few rods there in the way but you can put one compressor towards the hub / disc and the other toward the inner arch and get a socket on them, almost around the back of the rear strut. Just remember to turn the compressors about 10-20 turns each at a time to keep the spring compressed in an evenish way, otherwise one side will distort and expand as you compress the other and it just wont compress down. Once you've compressed it so the collar comes loose at the top, do the centre nut a turn while it's not under pressure (will be easier to undo). Your choice whether you take the bottom pin out and drop it off the hub before or after. Either way you'll need to be ready to support the strut and remove, so it either hangs there when you remove the bottom pin, or the force is on the bottom pin so it's trickier to get out, but unless you have two of you I would undo in the car, then get the pin out the bottom. Since you already compressed the spring away from the collar, just take a note where the components go together (in what order the rubber seating and bearing etc go in under the top plate of the strut). carry on taking off the centre nut at the top and remove it all off the top, take the spring out, wind the compressors off, put the new spring on, compress, pop components back on top in right order, put top cap on, put the nut on to hold it, wind it down. I think you can decompress the spring now if you want off the car, as it's easier to seat it right, but I did it on the car. Pop it back on the car, put the bottom pin in lining up popping bolts throught the holes in the top to inside, go in, bolt up, job done. Front' are a little trickier, there's two ways of doing them 1 - remove steering rod from hub, calliper, disconnect sensor and drop link then compress spring on the car (front doesn't take a lot at all, with the car jacked up, the springs are small, compressing only two coils together will make it come loose so a lot quicker than the back), now tilt hub from CV away from car still attached to the wishbone and then remove assembly with strut attached but pointing out of the arch (while attached to the car). Or remove hub from pinch bolt and ball joint connecting it to the wishbone and pull the whole caboosh out of the arch and seperate doing it off of the car. The job isn't too hard, just time consuming fidling compressing the springs and lining them up and getting old bolts undone / free, but tou should be able to do it in a few hours (and save a lot of cash). Oh, I'd grease the rubbers and mounts when putting them back in the top of the strut assembly, as when I re-assembled mine I had an anoying creaking / dry rubber noise from the driver side front strut. I'd cleaned the crud off the rubbers and it appeared to not like it and be dry causing an annoying noise, so I greased and all was good. Hope some of this makes sense anyway and is of use - I'm uber tired as I had no sleep last night, eyes and fingers aren't working well, have been working today and was just off to bed when I saw this Think it's pretty much right from memory. I have shed loads of pics and will post up when I get time to sort them out and upload them etc. Cheers, P.S soak all nuts and bolts over night a day before doing, just give them all a few squirts. P.P.S, when removing the top cap of the strut always point it away from you, I've had compressors slip before and fire the cap into my chest nearly busting my ribs, I've also had times where I could have sworn that it was compressed enough and it wasn't and they fire off. Thankfull I learn't my lesson a good few years ago on this and did this right.

Thanks for the advice,I'll do it myself as it looks quite straightforward from your description and saving money is a hobby of mine.

Hi, I changed mine on my c4 and the fronts were tricky as I could not swing the strut out from under the wing due to the driveshaft restricting movment. I ended up removing the driveshaft (large!! tq wrench required). Not impossible, just a little more tricky than the c2. jetbox

Ahh yes, that would be a pain I forgot yours is a C4, mines a C2. TBH if I can help it I don't normally get the strut off, as it's akward enough to hold while doing everything you need and it's easy to knock the disc or something while it's off and damage it. Here's how I did mine: I posted up a new thread with some pics that move prove useful to you if the process is similar.