Originally posted by transio
Good point. I hadn't really thought of it that way. But what if your force is less than maximum resistance? What if it's 15 pounds? if lay-down shock takes 15 pound vertical loads as 25 pound axial loads, then it's doing more work. Also, if it travels 18" versus 12", it's doing more work. It may perform better, but I'm pretty convinced that performance increase is at the expense of shock life. That's something that's common in all aspects of racing.

Dude -

1. There is no "vertical load" on the shock.

2. The shock doesn't care if there's 15, 25, or 25,000 pounds pushing on it. It only cares how quickly it's being compressed and extended. It's just two pieces of metal held together by some oil. When moved, it squishes the oil through one set of orifices or another (compression or rebound damping circuits) and the force transmitted depends on the specifics of the damping and the speed with which the two shock halves are being pushed together or pulled apart.

The shock also doesn't care if it's straight up or at a 45 degree angle. It's still got the same oil and same holes to squish it through in order to resist movement. BUT - fortunately smart engineers DO care about shock angle because by tilting the shock they can get more suspension travel without raising the ride height/center of gravity of the vehicle.

Can you imagine a dirt bike with 12" of suspension travel and vertical shocks? The shocks would have to be over 24" long. When you consider the reservoir, mounting eyes, etc. the shock would actually end up being nearly three feet long. Add half a wheel diameter to that and we've got a seat height of at least 4 feet....

It's the same with 4 wheeled stuff. In most cases, low c.g. is the way to go.

I guess theoretically it could reduce the life of the oil in the shock slightly. Since canted shocks travel less, the shaft velocities will be a little higher than if the shock were mounted vertically. The oil might thin a little sooner. If that's the case, I'd say the trade-off is worth it. Not just for high performance applications either. I wouldn't want the bed of my GMC any higher than it is. So I'm glad the shocks are tilted. And they seem to last just fine that way. 300,000 miles and only had to replace the shocks once.

If VX shocks are going bad at 30,000 then there's something else going on besides the fact that they're tilted - especially if they're leaking. Sure would like to get my hands on some and see what the problem is...

OK, Mr. Transio - I've flogged this horse enough. How about you?