Removing shock boot to avoid water and dirt being stuck???

So my buddy's friend who happens to be a mechanic told him that he should remove the rubber boot off the shock to avoid getting water and dirt being trapped in there. Anyone ever heard of this? It kind of makes sense to me. Figured id get an opinion from u guys

 

Bump, as I'm curious as well. I don't see why removing it would hurt, as plenty of shocks don't have boots. Just curious if there's a difference in design in anyway to compensate for that.

 

The boot is more to prevent stones from pitting or scaring the shock rod, but yes they do also tend to hold in sand and water which can lead to pitting anyway. It's a trade off but the purpose is to help the shock stay sealed as long as possible.

 

The rod is hardend chromium, nothing can scratch it accept corundum, diamond , or another sharp chromium rod. What will happen if you take the boot off is mud will get on the shaft and harden up, then the dust wipers in the shock body won't wipe it off . It will take it down into the shock during the stroke, the bushings will wipe it off and contaminate the oil. When the boots are on, only dust or a very light layer of dry residual muddy water will get on the shaft, and the dust wipers can handle that easy. If shock boots hampered operation in mud, why would all upper end off road shock companies send their shocks with boots.........leave the boots on it.

 

That's the thing though. A lot of the high end companies DONT have boots on their rear shocks for these trucks.

 

I cut mine off my B110s.

 

Yall do what yall want, I play in the mud all the time. I always have. I have also always left my shock boots on and hose em out when I wash my truck. Never had a problem. The companies that don't include boots are the one that cater to the wanna be desert racing scene...no mud out there.

 

I was merely asking a question to what you were saying.

 

Cut the bottom of the boot off and it wont trap water and mud. I have replaced a few pitted shafts on the rear on a tundra and a fj, one had kings and one had icons. So now I run boots on all rear shocks.

I ran fox shoxks for a bit and I really liked their rock shield that bolted to the bottom of the shaft.

 

Think about it this way...most modern dirt bikes don't have boots on the forks. Replacing fork seals once a year is the norm. On conventional fork bike with boots..replacing fork seals is about a every 5 year kind of thing

 

Speaking of mud, is there a 2nd Gen stuck pictures thread?

 

Same.....

 

Boots are great, but they need to be properly designed.

The boot needs to be vented at the bottom, or the rod end needs to have vented reliefs.

If you're playing off-road a properly setup boot will drastically increase shock life.

Improperly setup boots will hold in water and cause rusting.

So... I'd check if the boot or rod end is vented. If they are, and you go off-road, then I'd leave the boots on.