Wake
Full Access Member
Glad you didn't go for the passive shocks, I tried them on my 05 and hated them.
I never considered the Arnott reman before because they only replace the airbag and I figured the shock would be shot. I found out recently the rear shocks are built pretty darn good. I picked up an 03 EXT a couple weeks ago because I need a pickup truck and started working on it. I'm rebuilding the suspension and steering on this truck because of it's mileage, 180K. The rear shocks both had torn air bladders and the pump was seized from running constantly. I had the rears from my old 05 with 83K miles so I swapped them out and was surprised at outside of the bad airbags the shocks themselves were in decent shape. They had the same compression and rebound resistance from what I can tell as new shocks, I assume because the airbags take most of the abuse. The previous owner took good care of the truck, cosmetically and powertrain wise, but he told me he never did any suspension work on the truck which he purchased at 100K miles.
The fronts though seem to take more abuse because of the weight of the engine and the fact that they don't have airbags to save them from some of the abuse a shock takes. Those I'll replace on any auto-ride truck I buy. The backs though, I'll hold off replacing those in the future unless they have leaking or torn airbags.
I saved a little money replacing the pump. The pump in my 07 was noisy but working so I replaced it and never got around to throwing it out, so I took the old pump from the 07 and spliced in the 03's wiring harness and had a working pump for free. I don't know why GM changed the harness plug on the 07 models because everything else is the same as the earlier trucks.
I never considered the Arnott reman before because they only replace the airbag and I figured the shock would be shot. I found out recently the rear shocks are built pretty darn good. I picked up an 03 EXT a couple weeks ago because I need a pickup truck and started working on it. I'm rebuilding the suspension and steering on this truck because of it's mileage, 180K. The rear shocks both had torn air bladders and the pump was seized from running constantly. I had the rears from my old 05 with 83K miles so I swapped them out and was surprised at outside of the bad airbags the shocks themselves were in decent shape. They had the same compression and rebound resistance from what I can tell as new shocks, I assume because the airbags take most of the abuse. The previous owner took good care of the truck, cosmetically and powertrain wise, but he told me he never did any suspension work on the truck which he purchased at 100K miles.
The fronts though seem to take more abuse because of the weight of the engine and the fact that they don't have airbags to save them from some of the abuse a shock takes. Those I'll replace on any auto-ride truck I buy. The backs though, I'll hold off replacing those in the future unless they have leaking or torn airbags.
I saved a little money replacing the pump. The pump in my 07 was noisy but working so I replaced it and never got around to throwing it out, so I took the old pump from the 07 and spliced in the 03's wiring harness and had a working pump for free. I don't know why GM changed the harness plug on the 07 models because everything else is the same as the earlier trucks.
