S4 Suspension refresh?

[James Harley]

Hi all

I have decided to refresh the suspension on my 89 S4 this year and have started to look at/buy the parts I will need, as far as I'm aware the suspension has never been touched so everything is over 30 years old and pretty rusty. I have decided to go for the M474 option sports shocks, car is currently on the standard ones but I'd like it to feel a bit more sporty without becoming overly harsh so fingers crossed. I have ordered the shocks and a set of rear springs as the current ones are badly corroded. The front springs don't look too bad though so I'm hopeful that a light refurb will sort these.



Ideally I'd change everything but with an eye on costs I'm hoping to clean up and re-use as many components as possible, my question for the list then is what other parts will I definitely need to replace and which ones should be ok to just clean up?



I'm basically thinking that all the rubber parts will need changing, bump stops etc. and that hopefully anything metal will clean up, but I'm a bit worried that the threaded sleeves and rings for the ride height will be totally seized for example so any insight from those in the know would be greatly appreciated. Thank you



Ps I'm also thinking of changing the front wheels on the car back to ones with the correct offset, ET52 back to ET65, would this need be done before the suspension work though so as not to mess up the final realignment?


Cheers

Jimmy