OK I have a few questions, and I'm not sure if I shoulda posted this here or in the tech section, but I hope I'll get a few replies.. This is a question for all those who have air bags on their rides.. 1. How do you like the performance of it. 2. If you had to do it again would you 3. How hard was it overall to do it? I have a 1950 ford club coupe and am thinking of putting bags on it.. the car is pretty much all done now tho. interior paint, runs and drives.. i dont know if it is a project i should do seeing as it is pretty much done.. but if it something that wouldn't be to detrimental to the paint or interior i might consider it.. i already notched the back part of the drive line in order to allow the car to sit lower and not hit the hump in the driveshaft, so i was thinking ahead there.. but the car has a 8.8 Ranger rear end in it..so i dont know if that will play a part.. and it's got disc brakes in the front.. again.. not sure if that makes a big deal.. how hard is it to bag a 50 ford? what are the general costs .. and what would be the hardest part of the job... well any help would appreciated .. as i would like to possibly do this soon.. maybe even before vegas.. if it is something that could be done that quickly.. let me know what you guys think.. Thanks!!
well alot of this is going to depend on what you want it to do, you want it to lay frame or just be low with some adjustablity? its all going to make a deffernce. as far as performance its all varient on what set up your running, hose sizes and as well as brand and ect disc brakes and a ranger rear make absolutly no differnce shouldnt mess with anything at all with your paint or interior--less you want it to lay frame and need to re work the drivshaft tunnel but it seems you should be covered there already depending on how you want to do it changes the time line quite a bit. throw some bags in front in place of the stock coils and relocate the shocks, pull a bunch of leafs put in a block and run bags over the leafs and your rolling low in minimum time. if it needs the frame noched to get as low as you want, or if you end up running a 3 or 4 link rear suspension its going to take longer simply because theres more to set up lots of variables, what do you want?
My old mans got the same car that were bagin right now.From what we've seen so far the fronts pretty strait forward install. He optid to go 4 link in the rear though, its got 3 to 3 1/2 in blocks in back to lower it now. He wants it to sit on the ground and a lot of times you just cant do that with leafs. We buy pretty much everything from Fbi minis.
awesome.. so far i've got some great info.. thanks guys.. yea.. i'm not sure what i want yet.. laying frame would be awesome of course.. just depends on the price difference in getting it to lay frame.. instead of just low with some manuverability which sounds more manageable. It doesn't have to lay frame.. but that of course is always the best way to go for that awesome look i would eventually want.. How much does this kinda of stuff normally run.. i dont want the cheap stuff either.. i want to make sure it's dependable and works good.. i'd rather spend more and do it right if i have to!! What is involved in setting up a four link to get it to lay frame? i'm pretty new at this stuff.. and i'm mostly good at body work and light mechanical.. so i would need some friends help obviously with the fabrication part on this.. thanks for all the help and info.. i appreciate it! oh yea.. one more question.. how is the ride quality? is it bouncy or really hard and bottoms out alot like if you cut the coils.. i knew someone who cut their coils and everytime we hit a bump it was like BAMMM it sucked.
This is something I'm researching the heck out of right now for when my 50 is closer to being road worthy (still pretty far off). You can do a search on this site for some pretty good info on it, pretty much everyone seems stoked on it when they do it. I've ridden in bagged cars before that rode really well but it was not a shoebox, actually it was a 94 caprice wagon. I digress... You can check out this link on ruffrodder, it has some really good pictures: http://www.ruffrodders.com/cgi-bin/ib/ikonboard.cgi?;act=ST;f=49;t=647 I'm not sure its the right way to do the rear but its got some good pictures of the front. I think its just bags. Another popular thing for the front on shoeboxes is bags and switching the front spindles around and turning them upside down. Rocky did a good Tech on this in the tech section. That will give you bags plus like a 2 or 3 inch drop. Another popular thing is bags and fatman dropped spindles. Either way the front looks pretty straight forward. In the rear 3 and 4 links are pretty popular but that requires some pretty decent fab work, I've also seen a lot of guys take leaves out of their spring pack in the rear and run just 1 or 2 leaves plus lowing blocks plus bags in the rear. I've seen cars get pretty low this way but I think they wern't real fond of the ride and it seems like if you have any HP you could suffer some serious axle wrap. Just keep searching on here for air suspension and you'll see every setup imaginable.
yea.. this car has a 351W w/C6 trans and aluminum High rise intake , 4bbl carb.. and it gets up and go.. so i'd rather do a safe rear end set up because when i step on it.. she gets up and goes and i dont want any problems like that.. so i wonder if lowering it will be safe with the horsepower.. it goes good!! hahah =D
The pro stock drag racers use 4 links so you should be golden there but obviously your not going to want to use the air over leaf solution. Another good resource is suicidedoors.com. They have good prices on good equipement and have helpful tech support. They have everything including 4 links and can even build 4-links custom for you I believe. Also, pretty much every semi you see on the road now uses air bags instead of coils so you can be sure their rugged. I am intrested in the 8.8 for my car. I have a Ford FE 390 and C6 sitting on the engine stand right now. I read you could use one out of a ford explorer. Do you know if the ranger and explorer are diffrent sizes. The explorer one is supposed to be wider then stock so do you have any wheel clearance issues in the rear?
I'm assuming even though the front end has discs, it's still the original front clip. I used Shockwaves (shock and bag in one) up front on mine because I couldn't find a suitable placement for shock relocation without interfering with turning radius. I'm happy with this setup ,however, I did reversed eye and dearched springs in back with 3" blocks and when I dump the clutch, the wheelhop is violent! I'm looking into a ladderbar set up to fix it.
well i used the 8.8 out of a ranger. The only problem was for me as far as clearance it was a little wider then the standard one that was in there. and i had to use a smaller tire in the rear to clear the quarter opening for the wheel.. there is like about 1/2" of clearance or maybe a little more for the tire.. so it's a little tighter then i would have liked.. im' running 195/75/14's on it.. i wanted to run a wider tire.. but this works ok.. and i like how everything has been handling so far.. so thats good!
The best place in Phoenix for you air fittings and lines is a place called Hei Tek (used to be Plumbers) off of Deer Valley and like 3rd ave. Street Beat is were you want to go for everything else. if you need help with anything let me know I live in Phoenix and have some experience with air bags just p.m. me
+1 on Suicide Doors.com and FBI Mini. Both Mini Truck sites, but they have great deals on air suspension kits / pieces.
Hi Chris Could you tell me which shockwave part number you used for the shock and bag in one? was there any modifications you needed to make to get it to fit? cheers Toby
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