i notice that all my shock boots are torn up. i know they are meant to keep dust and stuff from getting inside the shock but i seen many people not even use them, can i just cut them off, or will dirt really make its way into the shock, do they even make any difference?? thanx.

 

same with mine, what to do?

 

i have the same problem please shed light on this subject

 

half the people that lower their cars with lowering springs never put the dust boots back on. there is an inner seal inside the strut to keep the dirt out. however the elements can corrode the shiny part of you strut and it will not function as smooth, and wil eventually lead to failure (maybe). you may not run into any problems for the life of your car, or you may have a strut failue within a year.
i guess it's not life-critical to your car, but sertainly helps. you can get oem dust boots pretty cheap, and it helps keep your struts in best workig order.

 

I believe you will be fine without them, assuming you drive under normal city road conditions, but I think that the absence of dust boots just allows for more crap to come into contact with the piston and seals and increases the (small) likelihood of something interfering with the functioning of the shock. Its safer to have em, but I don't think it'd kill ya not to have em.

I did some research on and found this:

http://www.monroe.com/tech_support/tec_faq.asp

 

You can get dustboots cheap from DaveB I think, and at any OEM parts places online, junkyards, etc. Or if ya wanna pay a little more, dealerships. You can get aftermarket boots from KYB as well.

 

speaking of aftermarket dusbtoots, i started a thread this morning about getting a dustboot with a shorter bumpstop: http://forums.maxima.org/showthread.php?t=434995
is it possible to get dustboots with a shorter bumpstop, but the top section of this bumpstop is still wider to fit into the top-hat perfectly, and let the dustboot 'hang' from the top instead of sitting on the bottom shelf of the sturt?