I have a 2008 40th AE. The rear has been slightly sagging and I have seen disintegrated pieces of what I now know to be the bump stops under the car while parked in the garage. The car bottomed out hard backing out of the driveway this weekend and the rear was extremely low with the whole family in it. We decided to switch vehicles and take my wife's CX-5.

Anyway, I know I need bump stops at the very least because it should not have bottomed out that hard backing out of the driveway. I read through some threads over the weekend and some say it fixed their sagging issues and others say it didn't. That is sort of beside the point. I've considered having shocks on hand and just doing them at the same time, even though typical items when you have bad shocks have not been noticed (car keeps bouncing for too long after a bump, car only gives one rebound when you push at a corner while parked, etc.). That leads me to finding the correct shock absorber for a 40th AE with the Bilstein shocks. I like the OEM ride and would prefer to keep it that way right now. When searching part numbers, there are no less than five part numbers for rear shock absorbers.

1) FE92-28-700 - listed as normal suspension
2) FE87-28-700 - listed as sport suspension
3) F184-28-700A - listed as special tuned, appears to be Shinka
4) FE91-28-700A - listed as special tuned, appears to be Shinka as well
5) F232-28-700A - listed as hard suspension

By process of elimination, it seems F232, under hard suspension, would be the Bilsteins in the 40th AE. Can anyone confirm this? When I back feed that part number into a couple of online Mazda parts dealers, one local dealer says it only fits 2008 models, which would lend credence to this being the correct one. Others still list it as fitting all S1 models.

 

It is confirmed that process of elimination and intuition were correct and that F232-28-700A is the correct part number for the 2008 40th AE Bilsteins. And judging by the old blue tag, these have been sitting on a shelf for a while.