Long story short was having a loud thunk issue in the rear of car. Decided to replace both rears with loaded struts from UNITY. Good news is the thunk is gone. Bad news is the car appears to sit a bit lower. See pics. Can someone measure a stock setup. Trying to figure how much lower I’m sitting.

front measures 6” from rim. Rear measures roughly 4.5” from rim.

 

My 2008 IS250 is running on stock rims and shocks:

F: 4.25"
R: 4.50"

There are different part numbers for AWD vs RWD front struts is it possible you got the wrong ones shipped to you?

 

did you take measurement same way I did. From rim to wheel arch? If so, thanks for taking the time.

yea I confirmed correct part number for AWD. Strange part is that the rear which appears lower is in line with what you measured. And the front seems to be high? Wtf. Hahaha

how many miles do you have. I have 267,000.

 

The bolts were tightened without the pre-load (car hanging up on the hoist). Take it back to the shop tell them to loosen up suspension bolts, place the car back on the ground, move it up and down few times then tighten the bolts. It should fix the gap up front.

 

I measured the same way you did with a tape measure and I'm happy to help. My IS has 147K miles.

 

the fronts weren’t touched only the rear. the fronts were replaced by kyb gas struts a long time ago. Like 100k miles ago. Never really noticed a huge difference in gap between rear and front until now. Is there any place online where it shows what stock suspension should be for wheel gap?

 

interesting. So the new rear struts line up with what you measured and the old ones which like I said…were replaced a while back are higher. Hmmm

 

These pics were posted by various members probably from a decade ago.

 

thanks for the info…so I just measured mine. Fronts which is old suspension measures 27” from ground and the rear measures 25.5”. So it’s a 1.5” difference. So the rear does seem to be lower than it should.

 

Did you transfer OEM springs onto the new shocks, or the new shocks came preassembled with the springs?

 

I purchased loaded struts as I don’t have a spring compression tool..also didn’t want to spend a fortune on a 15 year old car with 270k miles. Guess I get what I paid for hahaha