Mixing dampers front & rear?

[fivepint]

I have a wee dilemma with my BMW e39 Touring SE spec with self levelling rear suspension... I wish to improve body control with out ruining the ride too much and without lowering... and as economically as possible.

Now there aren't too many aftermarket dampers that are rated to work with the self levelling (air springs) but Bilstein do offer a solution in their B6 damper range.

Now my problem is that I didn't want to go to the B6 range as its rumoured to be a little firmer than mtechII so I was wondering if it was accepted practice to mix dampers front to rear, ie B4 up front & B6 in the rear...

My reasoning is that even Bilstein offer that option as in if you go to the B8 range you still get the B6 damper for the rear of a touring with self levelling.

Now I understand that the B6/B8 range are both 'sport' dampers where as the B4 is a slightly uprated OEM (10%) so hence the question, is it ok to mix?

Any Bilstein gurus out there care to comment?

Cheers

[DaveV6]

I thought the only difference between the B6 and B8 was that B8 is a shortened version for use with lowering springs. So they are the same rate of damper.

Running B4 on the front (softer) and B6 (harder) on the rear may give you interesting handling. I think that 'Drifters' use harder rear damping/springs to promote drifting, you might want to check. Then get the wife some skid pan training for her trips to Tescos ;-)