Hi there,

Well I am continuing(sp?) on my quest for a soft ride in my truck, nothing incredible, but this truck just rides like a lumber wagon on the roads around my house which are filled with potholes due to the sandy nature around here and washouts. I already have a thurenfab front end, along with King 2.5" shocks all around. My dad just picked up a set of air bags for the rear of his truck for towing and they weren't too badly priced at around $350 CAD for everything, I think they are rated at 3900lbs/side. Anyways I was looking at building something similar to the primary air setup where it replaces your entire rear suspension, or something like Big bad dodges ram has. Well I was thinking about it, and what I was going to do was take all the leafs out except for the top one, so there is no tension from the leafs, then putting the air bag on top of that, so all the weight is on the air bag, and all the leaf is doing is acting as a control arm holding the axle from moving front-back. So all the weight of the truck is on the shocks, and the air bags. Then for the front what I was thinking was replacing the coils with a set of gasser coils, then putting a set of air bags up there too. The idea behind this is to have really soft springs all around, with stiffly valved shocks, and then the air bags to hold up alot of the weight. What do you guys think about this?

 

im thinking thats not a great idea, because that rear axle is real heavy and that one spring will have a hard time holding that weight. also i dont think those air bags are ment to hold all the weight of the tuck and the load they are just ment to help with the springs.if you want a soft ride with air bags either buy one from kelderman air suspension.com or build your own 4 link with some big rig bags that will if your that mechanical.

 

Manufacturers spend millions designing suspension systems that take many factors into account: height vs. spring rates, longevity, axle wrap, etc. You may have a tough time just getting the right amount of cushioning while keeping the truck at a usable ride height. You also may have a horrible axle-wrap problem, because there will be far less leaves to control the axle housing winding up on takeoff. This can give you driveline vibrations and such also, asthe pinion angle will change more under accel/decel.

I have seen a Ram with airbags supporting a heavy load (welding truck), where the airbags were actually causing the frame rails to twist inwards, because of the leverage they exert on the frame rails. They aren't meant to support a constant heavy load, being too far outboard of the frame rail.

I know of a 1st. gen Ram that was converted to true air ride. It had its complete factory leaf springs, but used a cantilever setup in place of the shackles, with a big airbag in the middle, between the leaf springs. It was a great looking setup, owner very happy, but I have no idea where it came from. You may be able to find it, and maybe copy it to some degree. Your idea sounds great, but there may be too many headaches involved to be feasible.

 

Bad idea....gasser coils won't support the front end. You need to get a custom spring with a softer rate. Call Don, he can set you up with the right rate. As far as ditching everthing but the top leaf....torquefan is right, you'll have horrible axle wrap and end up snapping the leaf in short order...that's downright dangerous.

Try Sage Carli's mini packs, then have Don re-valve your rears. That'll make a big difference.

 

would his idea work if he also added traction bars to prevent wrap? at least in the rear