I got this response from a message I sent to Bilstein USA regarding the availability of the front B6s:

The product is simply on back order and should be available through your dealer by June –July 2019. Please continue to communicate with your dealer regarding their ETA on these items it may be sooner than ours.

Kind Regards,
Michael Ritchie
Technical Sales & Warranty Support Expert
thyssenkrupp Bilstein of America, Inc

At least I know the production of them hasn't been terminated. I guess I'll just continue to wait since I've had the rear shocks sitting in my garage for six months.

 

Do the B6 or B8 have the attachement points for the brake lines or do they have to be zip tied

 

Contacted Ross Sports in England, they had 5 B6's available, ordered 2.

Price was comparable to buying in CONUS, I was told expected shipping time is 1 week.

 

Thanks for the info. I cancelled my Summit order, ordered the front B6's through Ross Sport, and they were delivered in two days. Yeah...UK to US in TWO DAYS!

 

Amazing isn't it, and only a few dollars more than buying stateside...

 

The B6 front struts have the same stud attachment point for the brake line & ABS cable brackets as the OEM struts.

 

What are the ramifications of running the B8's with lowering springs designed for the stock length struts? Its ~0.6" more preload which seems like a lot.

I currently have GTWORX springs but i think that much more preload is a bad idea. Tirerack doesnt have the B6's but the B8's can be had from them for $770 for the set.

 

As far as I know, there are no springs designed for the B8's, so Bilstein may be expecting aftermarket springs to be used. But that's an assumption that would be totally incorrect. It will depend on whether spring mounting locations have been altered. If its assumed that the spring mounting locations relative to the shock/strut attachment points to the car are unaltered, then B8's are well suited for aftermarket springs. The B8's only reduce the amount of available shock travel by 0.5" which is pretty small compared to the range of total travel of the stock struts (roughly 6" front and 5.5" rear). The GTWorx drop the car by approx 0.75-1.0" in the front and 0.5" in the rear, so that matches up pretty well with the reduction in shock travel. That's not quite correct for the rear suspension which has some lever ratio to it, but close enough for this discussion. The point being here is that you will not be giving up any droop travel compared to stock struts with stock springs, and droop travel can be very important to maintaining a comfortable ride and maintaining wheel contact on bumpy roads. And the ride height will be unchanged compared to the aftermarket springs on stock struts.

However, if the B8's alter the spring mounting locations, perhaps on the assumption that stock springs are to be used, then they may not match up so well with any aftermarket springs because the amount of compression travel in this scenario would be reduced 0.5" compared to using stock springs, and the car would sit another 0.5" lower in the front and perhaps 0.75" lower in the rear compared to the same aftermarket springs on stock struts.

The only way you'll know for sure which scenario is correct is to buy a set and compare to stock struts. You could try asking Tirerack to make some measurements, but not sure if they'd go for it. In the old days they might have. Not so sure now.

 

Thanks for the feedback. So many people say the Bilsteins ride great but the ambiguity between the B6 and B8 vs MR muddies the water. Plenty of people also rave about the Ohlins as the best all around option so after placing an order for bilsteins then learning there was a 3-4 week lead time I canceled it and decided to go with ohlins... Wasn't able to get the $2k price letsgetthisdone quotes but $2100 was close enough from MAP for their last set in stock. PSI was around 22XX when I asked them.

Who wants to buy some GTWorx springs?

 

I've not seen a single negative review of the R&Ts. You'll be very impressed with them. If you aren't already aware, you'll need to assemble them yourself. Its not hard, but wanted to mention it. I've tried a range of ride height, preload, and damper settings for 9/9. I can pass those onto you if you want.

 

mrfred, can you share your settings in this thread so that we have a searchable record of it? I'm on the verge of ordering a set of Ohlins R&T in the next couple of weeks...
Thanks!

 

Will do. Can't get to it until next week though.

 

I'll take those gtworx springs off of you. Check your PM inbox.

 

I'll buy those gtworx springs from you. Check your PM inbox.

 

I'm getting confused by all of the comments and the description of Bilstein B6s... A lot of the descriptions for B6s say something like "Stock height only"

If I want to go with Swift Spec-R springs, should I go with B6 or B8?

I was running Evo MR struts and one of my swift springs cracked, so I think I should update struts at the same time...