Even though shock absorbers have been in use since the early days of the automobile,

they are not well understood by the general driving public. Even automotive enthusiasts
will neglect and often ignore the shock absorbers on their car, degrading the car’s
handling performance and ride comfort.

Even worse, worn shocks can be dangerous, especially during the severe maneuvers
that might be necessary to avoid an accident. As we will see, for such a simple yet
effective device, shock absorbers seem to get little respect.

The gravity of the situation

Strangely enough, despite their name, shock absorbers don’t absorb shocks. In reality,
that is the job of the springs in a vehicle’s suspension system. As a wheel encounters a
bump, the wheel moves upward, compressing and storing the energy of the bump into
the spring. This compression is actually what absorbs the shock of the bump.

But now that the spring is compressed, it contains potential energy that must be
released. The spring does this by bouncing back to its original uncompressed length, at
the same time pushing the vehicle’s body upward. In an example of the old adage “what
goes up, must come down,” gravity pulls the weight of the body back down,
recompressing the spring. If the shock absorbers are worn, the vehicle ends up
bouncing its way down the road after every bump until all of the energy is used up. In
the worst cases, this bouncing can actually pull a vehicle’s tires off the ground, making
the vehicle uncontrollable.

Bring on the dampers

Shock absorbers, more properly called dampers, are mounted alongside (or inside) the
springs at each corner of the vehicle. A shock absorber’s job is to provide resistance to
the movement of the spring. Technically speaking, it does this by taking some of the
energy that is being used to compress the spring and turning it into heat. So whether
the vehicle is bouncing up or down from a bump in the road, that motion is held in check
by the shock absorber, and once again some of the kinetic energy released by the
spring is changed into heat by the shock absorber. This conversion of energy keeps the
vehicle’s body from bouncing more than once or twice, providing a controlled ride and
helping to keep the vehicle’s tires safely in contact with the ground.

How do shock absorbers work?

If you have ever waved your hand back and forth through water, then, in principle, you
know how a shock absorber works. The resistance to motion you feel with your hand
changes with speed – the faster you move your hand, the more energy it takes to push
against the resistance of the water.

A shock absorber works much the same way. Inside the shock absorber there’s a piston
that moves inside a tube that is filled with oil. As the piston moves, the oil is forced
through tiny holes and valves within the piston, precisely controlling the amount of
resistance to movement. This resistance to the motion converts the energy into heat.
(Yes, a shock absorber that has been doing its job over a rough road does get warm!)
Although there have been many different designs for shock absorbers over the course
of automotive history, today there are four basic types available:

 Twin-tube
 Mono-tube
 Gas-filled mono-tube
 External reservoir

Sometimes these types of shock absorbers are incorporated into a strut-type

suspension that uses the shock absorber as part of the spring support, but the basic
principles still apply.

Twin-tube shocks
The twin-tube design is the most common and often the least expensive. These are the
ordinary shock absorbers that typical passenger cars and trucks use, and they are
widely available at car dealerships, auto parts stores and repair facilities. As the name
implies, in a twin-tube shock, there are two actual tubes – one the outer shock body and
the other an inner cylinder in which the piston moves. Tiny holes or orifices in the piston
as well as special valves between the inner and outer tubes restrict the flow of oil to
control wheel motion.

The limitations of twin-tube shocks become apparent when they are used over very
bumpy roads. In this case, the rapid motion of the piston can cause the oil to overheat
and to foam, reducing the shock absorber’s ability to control wheel motion. The result is
a ride that becomes increasingly sloppy, especially when traveling over a washboard
surface. Heavy-duty twin-tube shock absorbers are usually stronger, with more robust
piston shafts and mounting points, and they may use oils that are more resistant to
foaming, but ultimately they still have the same limitations.

Mono-tube shocks
The heat generated in the twin-tube shock tends to get trapped within the walls of the
shock absorber body, reducing its effectiveness in controlling wheel motions. The
mono-tube shock absorber uses a piston traveling within a single tube that is exposed
more directly to the air. The general advantages and disadvantages of this design are:

 By getting rid of heat more easily, mono-tube shocks are less susceptible to
overheating on rough roads.
 They are more expensive to manufacture, and the tolerances must be higher and
the seals better to keep the oil inside the shock body.

Gas-filled mono-tube shocks

To prevent foaming and bubbles in the oil, which degrades shock-absorber
performance, a gas-filled mono-tube shock has a chamber of high-pressure nitrogen
above the oil chamber. This high-pressure gas makes it difficult for bubbles to form in
the oil, even when the shock absorber moves in and out very quickly, as it might while
traveling rapidly on a very rough or washboard road.
Gas-filled shocks are expensive, since they require strict manufacturing tolerances, but
they are very resistant to fade and consequently are popular in off-road racing and
rallying. Gas-filled shocks, by the way, are not the same as “air shocks,” which use an
air chamber separate from the shock oil. An air shock is actually an air spring that raises
or lowers the vehicle when air is added or removed through a valve.

External reservoir shocks

the top of the line in shock absorbers is the external-reservoir design. These shocks,
primarily designed for ultra-high performance and racing applications, use a small,
lightweight shock body that is connected through a hose to a reservoir of oil mounted in
a different part of the vehicle. The goal of an external reservoir shock is to:

 Reduce the weight at the wheel for better handling

 Provide better cooling for the oil in the reservoir
 Provide significant air space within the reservoir so that the hot oil can expand
without blowing out seals
 Allow superb adjustability as the oil flows to and from the shock body

External reservoir shocks are very expensive and are really only needed in extreme
high-performance applications.