Walt,
I think these days, parts are replaced rather than diagnosed and fixed. Everything has become modular. There was no mention of what caused the strut to become defective. I do not believe that it was something obvious or visually identifiable. If I sent an email to the service advisor, I am sure she would respond back “strut defective”, with no explanation, nor do I think that the tech really cared. They just move on to the next job.
I am aware that others on this forum, from all over, have had this same issue, so I do not think it is isolated. Perhaps there was a batch that went out, that had a defect in them, and later corrected on the next production run. Who knows.
This kind of stuff really interests me. Last week I did a bunch of digging online to understand how this stuff works. There is one particular YouTube channel “Engineering Explained” that has a great video on how these things work. Then I looked up Brownian Motion.
https://youtu.be/hiaMpG4Y640
I have always felt that it is better to be informed than uniformed, that way there is less of a chance you will be taken advantage of. This knowledge did in fact come in handy when I was talking to the service manager.
Anyway, the part costs roughly $300. There is another thread on this site by Board57796. He created an incredible DIY on installing lowering springs. This thread would be a good tool if you chose to do the job yourself. I was able to get it done at a significantly reduced rate (BMW Goodwill), had that not been the case, I would have had my Indy do it.
https://www.6post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1553730
L