What's it worth? 1981 911 used boge struts

William Miller · 04-09-2008, 04:49 AM

I'm selling Right and Left Struts to some one local. He's doing a brake upgrade.
1981 lower strut / spindle. Left and Right.
I've seen $200-225 ea at a few used parts dealers.
I just want to know whats fair.

I also Have 2 Bilstien for Boge inserts for same. HD valving.
Good shape, probably 2-3 years old and maybe 10,000 miles.

Is this the right place to ask?
Not for sale yet so I didn't want to post in classifides.
Thanks!

john walker's workshop · 04-09-2008, 05:41 AM

up to $250 each is common.

William Miller · 04-09-2008, 07:41 AM

Thanks, any idea on the inserts?

SCrescue · SCrescue's Garage

Bill,
FWIW, half the price of new replacements is generally conceded to be the rule of thumb as a starting point....then factor in things like condition and mileage to factor up or down from there.

Mike...

john walker's workshop · 04-09-2008, 08:31 AM

used inserts are kind of worthless really. throw them in on the deal if you get a decent price for the struts.

William Miller · 04-10-2008, 07:02 AM

Thanks, I generally use 1/2 price, but as far as I know you can't just buy the Boge spindle and lower tube without the whole thing. Maybe you guys know a source? When I re-built this front end I bought a complete Bilstien set.

The HD inserts were only used about 5-10,000 miles and were Bilstien. They look and feel like new.

Already sold one set for $150. (They had the "sport" valving.)

I think some people just want them as cores to send to Bilstien for re-valving.

Thanks for confirming my thinking on the matter.

EarlySport · 04-10-2008, 04:33 PM

Out of curiosity, why did you buy complete Bilstein struts and not just new inserts for your Boge struts?

William Miller · 04-11-2008, 07:15 AM

I was chasing down a problem with the front end shuttering under medium braking.
This was after a front end rebuild with mixed and matched parts as well as a brake upgrade.
After trying to diagnose it for a few months (Checking, removing and replacing parts) I decided that there were too many unknowns so by buying the new Bilstien struts complete I eliminated many possibilities with one shot. Such as worn spindles etc.

Turns out that the problem was that someone in the past did a Gorilla Job installing the bearing races. They were cocked and the hubs were dammaged. Spindles ended up being OK, but I kept the new struts anyway.
The first time I did any maintenance on the car I noticed the front bearings were very loose. I now suspect this was the reason.

Its a great car despite some of the PO issues.

So in short I had a good set of spindles and a few sets of inserts from 2 different cars.