Review on Bilstein 33 253190 33253190 Shock Absorber by Brett Martinez

Installed on my 16 year old son's 2018 F150 FX4 with tow pack. Very easy installation but the mechanic did it because I didn't want to peel my knuckles. It took him 15 minutes. The truck did not have to be raised and the rear wheels removed to install these dampers. Stock shocks replaced when truck has driven 5,000 miles. The OEM shocks were really quite low quality. The OEM shocks were weak and I was able to compress and expand them easily after removing them. With the Bilstein installed, the rear of the truck feels more planted, especially on speed bumps and rough roads. Is it a dramatic difference? no But it's noticeable. The 5100 has no real impact on body roll. The improvement provided by these dampers is probably most noticeable when towing or off-road. I put these Bilstein 5100 shocks on my own 2015 F350 and noticed a huge difference, but I do a lot of SuperDuty towing. Overall, for the price, these shocks are a nice and easy upgrade for the F150. However, if you want to improve handling on the pavement, I would recommend installing a rear anti-roll bar. We fit Helwig shock absorbers on our trucks and the improvement from the rear stabilizer bar is much more noticeable than the improvement from the 5100 shock absorbers. The stabilizer bar noticeably improves body roll. However, upgrading the rear stabilizer bar costs three times more than the cost of the shock absorbers.