i replace my struts with blues this weekend, and i cut the bumpstops to match my h&r springs. the 03 maxima has the bumpstop and dust-boot as a single piece. now.... the top of the dustboot/bumpstop is wider, and fits into the top-hat very nicely. the top section of the bumpstop actually sits in the top-hat, and keeps the whole dust-boot from falling lower and sitting on the bottom section of the struts. since i have cut the top section off, the dusboot/bumpstop is now no longer haning onto the tophat.
is this the way most of you have cut off the bumpstops on your cars?
is there an aftermaket dustboot/bumpstop that is shorter than stock by about 3/4"-1"? this would be the ideal solution, an aftermaket dustboot/bumpstop piece that's shorter, but still has a wider top section to sit in the top-hat properly and cover the entire inner strut piece.

P.S. Pic of the piece i trimmed off can be found on housecor's site here:
http://www.innerbean.com/housecor/im...l/123_2353.jpg

 

wouldnt the missing pumbstop increase the chances of bottoming out? i replaced my rear boots with aftermarket ones wehn i also put in blues this week, and i am also now missing the bump stop, just realized this may be a bad thing, or is it ok not to have them?

you should have just cut the bottom of the boot instead.

 

ummm, you should definetely have bump stops. they need to be trimmed if you lower your car.

 

I didn't cut mine, so I didn't mess around with em to see what they actually consisted of. Are they literally just one piece of rubber? I remember Irish44J telling me that the 2k1s have a separate bumpstop within the dustboot or something like that, so you don't actually cut the dustboot, but a separate piece which is the bumpstop.

 

That's weird. My bumpstop didn't have that black piece at the very top in Housecor's pic. It just had the 3 trims -- 2 of which broke on their own, so I had them removed. Actually, I wanted one trim from the bumpstop removed, but then I was advised just one wouldn't make much of a difference at all - and at least 2 would be decent. So when Jeff (MaximumTuning) took apart the strut and spring...he noticed that two trims of the bumpstop had broken off.

Heh.

 

yup, they are just once piece of rubber. the topmost ring of the bump-stop sits in the top-hat real nice, and holds the whole dustboot/bumpstop piece hanging in correct position to cover the shiny part of the strut. as it is now, with the top piece cut off, the dusbtoot sits on the bottom pertch, where the spring contacts the strut. even with the strut compressed when the car is lowered, there is about 1/2 exposed on the very top. the top-hat hangs over it, so there is no direct "splashing" of anythign from the road, but it could get in there indirectly anyway. i would rather get an aftermarket dusboot/bumpstop combo that has shorter bumpstops, and seals from the bottom and the top.

 

Gotcha.

Btw, here is a link to KYB dusboots sold by Cattman. You may or may not be able to get em cheaper elsewhere online.

http://www.cattman.com/prod_struts_springs.html

Not sure how they look compared to stock either... from what I recall, they might be slightly shorter.

http://www.cattman.com/img/prod/thumbs/dust%20boots.jpg

 

Can we edit that pic to just a link please? Really annoying to read the thread...

 

Done......

 

hmm, those don't look like they have that wider top part that goes inside the top hat. almost like they took oem boots, and cut off the top section real nice on a band saw, or some sort of non-razor blade hand tool. =)