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I received my order a couple weeks ago and have been through the fronts but not the rears yet. Here is what I've found so far:
1. Packaging was lacking with loose parts in the boxes but no damage to anything. Some minor blemishes (small edge dings or scuffs on metal surface) under the anodizing, which typically means the blemishes were there before anodizing so parts are probably not protected well while moving through the shop or while moving between machine shop and plating house.
2. No leaks in the box.
3. Some varying finishes on outside machined surfaces. Typical of a commercial machined part for industrial use but not on consumer parts but nothing that shows unless you are looking close.
4. While disassembling we found anaerobic sealant used excessively that had to be cleaned out of the reservoir end cap snap ring grooves.
5. The wiper seal cap has a set screw to secure the wiper seal housing into the cap. The threads are 10-32 but there were 8-32 set screws in the holes and one was missing. The threads on the seal housing were very sharp but no burrs that could come off and the threads fit well together worked smoothly.
6. 1 of the 2 pistons was deburred well and the other was not.
7. The piston nut had so much thread locker that the shims were glued together but the valving was correct.
8. The shims are stamped and have raised edges from the process, which also caused them to fit very tightly on the shaft. Many of them looked used but were not in bad shape. I paid for 2 extra shim packs due to the extra shims in my valving and said there was no need to send the left overs but there was a handful of extra shims sent with my order.
9. The bores of the shock body and reservoir were smooth and reflective with no scratches or defects. The shaft finish was a 4 Ra and 16 Ra on the housing walls.
10. The shaft was straight to .00008 and probably purchased chrome rod that they just machined the ends on. No problems with the chrome.
11. The pistons are flat and the two sides are parallel within .0004.
12. I ordered the wrong reservoir clamps and returned them. I'm still waiting for the refund 3 weeks later.

What I did to them was deburr the pistons and shims. I flat sanded the shims on a surface plate just to remove the raised edges from stamping which also removed the thread locker that was on them. This made them fit well on the shaft which they were tight before. I cleaned the thread sealant out of the grooves and reused the oil. Put them back together with 10-32 set screws and installed them on the truck a week ago. Everything is working so far and no leaks so far.

If anything changes or if I see something different with the rears, I'll update this.

Would I do it again, or pay twice as much next time for a higher end shock? From what I have seen so far I would order from them again unless I had money in the budget to spend twice as much.
 
so theyre still junk and need to be rebuilt straight out of the box
I spent an hour and half on each shock and saved roughly $325 per shock. One man's junk is another man's treasure and time will tell. I'm not praising them, nor would I recommend someone buy them, but I would mention the pros and cons to someone like myself who has a tight budget and time to spend cleaning them up and let them make their own decision.
 
I spent an hour and half on each shock and saved roughly $325 per shock. One man's junk is another man's treasure and time will tell. I'm not praising them, nor would I recommend someone buy them, but I would mention the pros and cons to someone like myself who has a tight budget and time to spend cleaning them up and let them make their own decision.

so let me rephrase it for you

so theyre complete junk to 99.99% of people and to 100% of people they need to be gone through and rebuilt straight out of the box

is that better? :LOL:
 
so let me rephrase it for you

so theyre complete junk to 99.99% of people and to 100% of people they need to be gone through and rebuilt straight out of the box

is that better? :LOL:
So 99.99% of all people think they're junk. How do suppose they've stayed in business since 2007 if only 1 out of every 1000 people don't think they're junk? The reality is less than 1% of Pirate 4x4 members think they're junk. See you're just spouting off with made up numbers because you think that the entire world should listen to 10 Pirate 4x4 members.
 
"You cant fix stupid" is why they are still in business. Morons see cheap coilovers so they buy them. 3/4 of the morons that buy them dont have a fucking clue about coilovers in general so they have no idea they bought junk unless they are leaking or completely fucked right out of the box. These morons run them and have good things to say because they don't know any better.... The other 1/4 that buy them without doing research figure out they are junk early on and ditch them soon after.


If these shocks are so much cheaper and just as good as the big name brands why aren't they widely used in a bunch of different offroad motorsports? Is it because teams like spending money they dont have to on name brand stuff with cool stickers, or is because they know that spending more will get them a better quality product to start with?

Good luck with them. Hopefully nothing catastrophic happens to those shocks while your wife is driving the truck you built her "on the cheap".


BTW.... If you want to have a real conversation about this stuff with somebody other than yourself, head on over to: WWW.pirate4x4.com

Everyone left and went to the new site.
 
Looks to me like the sliver came from the seal head while they were taking it apart. I'm not saying foa's a great by any means because the pistons in mine all had sharp edges that cut he o-rings when they were assembled and I still have a leaking top cap that I can't get to stop even after a new o-ring, lock tight on the threads and ultra black rtv above the threads...very frustrating. I'd buy Fox or King next time. Probably Fox?
 
Took it apart today-

Your video pretty much summed up everything I said in my review except that after deburring and cleaning them up, they have 4K miles and 6 months with no leaks and no regrets.
As far as your comment about the shim thickness. Standard spring steel material tolerance is +/- .001 and calipers are not adequate for measuring and comparing .001 differences. Especially since she was using the wrong part of the calipers to measure and potentially measuring the burrs on the edges as I pointed out.
 
shock companies buy discs tighter than standard shim stock. It is easy to find check the Bokers catalog. I realize that she was not perfect with the calipers, but the variation was higher than expected. And I couldn’t find my 0 to 1 mic.
 
shock companies buy discs tighter than standard shim stock. It is easy to find check the Bokers catalog. I realize that she was not perfect with the calipers, but the variation was higher than expected. And I couldn’t find my 0 to 1 mic.
The FOA shims on my shocks after deburring the edges and measuring with a mic were all within .0005, which isn't quite as good as several FOX and KING shims measured at the same time that were within .0003 but .0002 isn't going to make a difference. I am still not trying to convince anyone to buy FOA, just reporting what I found like I said I would.

Another thing worth mentioning is that one of the rear shock reservoirs came with a dent in it that could be seen on the inside so would have caused a problem with the IFP. I emailed FOA and they sent me 2 new reservoir bodies and about 30 or so extra o-rings and shaft seals. I would have rather got a good one the first time but still glad the support was good.
 
Don't have a solid answer for you. The next FOA project is lift shocks for the full size GM/Chevy trucks...not sure what's after that.
Chris! Help me
I am planning gm fullsize coilover but am in difficulties in options with valves!
 
@ADD has gotten the run around from foa for a long time. Based off of his one experience, and the price difference I’d never buy an FOA shock. For $100 more per shock I could have customer service that actually services the customer.
 
@ADD has gotten the run around from foa for a long time. Based off of his one experience, and the price difference I’d never buy an FOA shock. For $100 more per shock I could have customer service that actually services the customer.
I always see comments like this but Ive never been able to find a new Fox, King, SAW, or Radflow 2.5x14 coil-over for $350. In my experience fox and king cost about double. Yeah I know they go on sale but so does F-O-A. Im not going to argue that the big name brand shocks don't have better quality but the price difference is more then everyone makes it out to be
 
I always see comments like this but Ive never been able to find a new Fox, King, SAW, or Radflow 2.5x14 coil-over for $350. In my experience fox and king cost about double. Yeah I know they go on sale but so does F-O-A. Im not going to argue that the big name brand shocks don't have better quality but the price difference is more then everyone makes it out to be
I haven’t found a FOA coilover for $350 either. I found some for $500 and a Radflo and King for that price or damn close to it. Show me where you’re finding that $350 FOA coilover because I don’t believe you for a second.
 
I haven’t found a FOA coilover for $350 either. I found some for $500 and a Radflo and King for that price or damn close to it. Show me where you’re finding that $350 FOA coilover because I don’t believe you for a second.
It’s right on their website. One coil over without springs is $245
 
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