Has any body had any good performance out of ART Shock Waves on a heavy car like the 50's 60's 70's ???????? Have this 65 riv in the shop that requires about 150psi in the front and 135psi in the rear to to make it not over steer but at that psi it rides very ruff. If the front and rear psi in lowered 30psi it wil ride almost acceptable but it has very bad body roll or oversteer. Aginst my recomendations my customer ordered this kit from ART and had them installed at another shop as i would not install them for him. They told him there shock waves are the best that he can get for ride quailty. I have been on the phone numerus times with them but they have no answer for our issue's and claime no one else has complained about these problems. Also one of the rear shocks have oil coming out of the air line port already and this car has less than 1000 miles on it. I know we are not the only ones with these issue so if you have them also lets hear about yours. We are taking out the shock waves and putting in 8" dia front bags and 7" dia rear bags with remote mounted shocks to fix his rive Thanks, Rick Erickson of EXK
I've got shockwaves in the front of my truck and they work fine. 135 for the rear sounds like a lot. Are they each on their own solenoid?. Swaybars front/ back? Have you gone to their site forum and asked any questions? They have been helpful to me.
Body roll and oversteer aren't the same thing...but excessive body roll can induce oversteer in some suspension designs. I don't know much about air bags, but I have to ask...are the rear bags and front bags Tee'd together so that air can transfer back and forth from one side of the car to the other without opening valves? Do you have front and rear sway bars attached? LOL...Entourageguy beat me by this much! ><
From recommendations from a 'big time' builder here in the mid-west, I won't use the shock waves on the front of heavy cars. Just like you are experiencing they require a large amount of psi to overcome the smaller air spring on the shockwaves. Marty McF.
Got them on my 63 Riviera and overall they are okay but I probably wouldn't buy them again...the psi you are talking about on the back seems extreme to me...I run about 40-45 on the back and about 100 on the front and get the at***ude and close to a decent ride
Why not just engineer the suspension correctly without using airbags? Airbags are a triumph of marketing over sound suspension engineering practice. Just because you can use them doesn't mean to say you should.
I have them on my '65 El Camino. 95-100 in the front and 30 psi in the back. I have SC&C upper control arms, ART lowers, 1 1/8 sway bar up front rides good handles good. Just needs a rear sway bar.
I have actually had some luck running them with an ac***ulator in conjunction with the shock wave. You see, air bags work off of volume and air pressure, so the more air volume the bag has the less pressure it is going to take to lift the car. Well, with Shockwaves, the shock intrudes into the space inside the bag and robs it of a portion of the air volume. So you might try running some half-gallon air tanks right next to the Shockwaves to see if you can use the space in the tank to trick the bags on the shockwaves into thinking there is more air volume in the Shockwaves. You also have to run a large diameter line between the reservoir and the Shockwave. Once you get the pressure thing ironed out, it will make it easier to decide what to do about the body roll (individual valves, anti-sway bars, etc...)
I like OG's point, also make sure each corner is individually valved. Do you have sway bars? Suppliment the"springs" with some thick anti roll bars, and make absolutly sure that each corner is isolated to prevent air transfer with body roll
The rear 5" dia shock waves are attached to the lower control bars about 6" in front of the axle. Where the orginal coil spring were. Thats why it requires so much air presure at ride height. Bad geometry for this style bag Have 4 solenoided isolatting all 4 corners, We recently put a 1 1/4" dia fr sway bar and a 7/8" dia rr sway bar. We are very experenced in installing bags and suspension geometry, Been at it for over 20 years now. My customer has 2 other cars bagged by us and he knows what a properly bagged car rides & drives like (Usally better that most unbagged car). He exspected his rive to ride even better with these hight dollar shock waves than his other cars do with the old style cheap bags.
My 48 Chevy Fleetline custom that weighs 3800 lbs.I have heidts front suspension,dropped spindles,sway bar with shock wave on the front only.It has 10,200 miles on it and they still perform great.I have them valved seprate on the switch panel from side to side.I run 80 lbs preasure. Good luck figuring out the problem.
Have shockwaves on my 55. Run 50psi the majority of the time. As much as 80psi to cruise on crowned or rough roads, or to clear speed bumps, etc. The lines are T-d together as one in the front and have a 1 inch sway bar. Absolutely no problems for 5 plus years... Regarding some comments above, it has nothing to do with "engineering it correctly". I run the car 3/4 inch off the pavement 90% of the time and enjoy it there, but I can lift it up to get in steep drives, run on crowned roads or clear other obstacles, plus you can raise it before placing a jack underneath. Handles well and looks good. Traditional or not, I wouldn't build a severely lowered car without them...
Got some good news today from ART. After talking to them numerus times on this issue and explaining to them my customer knows well how a properly bagged car rides like and he is very unhappy with there shock waves. They have agreed to add 8" dia bellows to the front shocks and 6" dia bellows to the rear shocks and fix or replace any bad shock for a very low price.
EXK- thats great that ART will help you guys out.I think they are a reputable company and don't want a bad reputation.They do make a great product ,we are lucky to have them on our side to help us build LOW ride but drivable hot rods and Customs.I once had a problem with Alden coil over shocks on my Model A .I talked to Frank Alden at the nationals and before I got home a new set was waiting at my door step.How cool is that for standing behind your product MADE IN USA.
Yea i will defenitly give ART the thumbes up, Just think if GM or CHR had stood behine there products like ART does they probally would not be in the sad condition they are in today. I know many die hard GM and CHR fans now driving Toyota's mostly because of there better customer service. I am not one of them thoe. I still belive in the USA and will only have an amercian made car. My daily's are a tweaked dodge charger srt8 and an 08 vett
I use Shockwaves on my 61 Lesabre. I don't know that i am satisfied with the SW's because @ 130psi frame-to-ground is only 4 3/8". I was running them for at least a year with a pair of specialy made 1" aluminum spacers, with the SW's mounted ontop of them to give a little extra height. I ran rear bags at 45-60psi, front at 100. This seemed to give a fairly "stock" ride height for sustained driving. After the internal shock on one of my SW's became bent/overextended, i had it rebuilt and I took the spacers out figuring they are why it probably got bent. Now I am back to square one. 130psi = 4 3/8" frame-to-ground height up front. I don't feel that I'm getting all the height/travel out of the SW's that they should go. Anyone know if the sway bar affects this? Possibly the length of the sway bar mounting bolts & spacers being too long??? BTW, ART told me $100-$200 to have my shockwave rebuilt but when I got it back I saw they replaced it with a completely new one and didn't bill me for it. I still have to call them back with some questions and find out why they didn't bill me.
I have Shockwaves on the front of my '92 Caprice Wagon. Tough to get a car heavier than that. I found that while they worked pretty well, I had to re-engineer some things to get it to ride/sit the way I wanted, such as re-working the placement of the lower mounting point in the control arm. They aren't just a bolt in and go sort of deal like people expect. I also found that the supplied poly bushings didn't like the weight that was placed upon them, so I switched to the spherical bearings that are available instead. If the shock is leaking oil, it's likely been over extended or compressed. With "properly engineered" geometry, bracketry, and what-not, the use of air springs is perfectly sound. Do you think the OEMs and long-haul truckers would use them if they weren't sound? Problem is, most of the times hobbyists/shops don't think things out and just slap the air springs in place of the coil springs. Sure it's great to have a nice riding coil suspension that sits low ALL the time, doesn't have bump steer or other performance compromises , but it's not always practical. Sometimes folks are stuck w/ outside reasons that necessitate an air suspension; maybe they've got a steep driveway apron, occasionally need to tow a trailer, or any dozens of other reasons.
For a given weight, you need : 'comfortable-ride psi x number of square inches of bag cross-section to support the car ( One psi will push one pound by definition of "psi" ) The shock in a Shockwave takes away from the cross-section area compared to a regular bag, so the fatter 8" bags will add the required area. Bubbletopbuick.......check at your favourite ride-height to see if you need to trim the length of the sway bar links ........but keep them as long as possible so they don't bind and they should be at 90* to the bar ends. Congrats to AirRide for the good service. Jim
Looking for a bolt in application where I could "reverse" my decision, was the reason I installed the Shockwaves on the front of my 59 Cadillac, They were a very easy install but required 125psi in them for a safe cruising height since the weight on the front of this car is high. At first all was good, but after a short while certain components started failing. The poly bushings on the bottom can not take the weight of this car and start collapsing, the sideload of the steel shock strut against the aluminum shock housing inside the bag started wearing the top of the shock housing into a oval shape, then the oil came out and the shock got "pressurised". The upper mount on these have a steel swivel joint stud that fits tightly into a aluminum housing, this is now loose and worn. Everything was installed carefully and down to the instructions, but I feel they are not suitable for a 5000lb car with regular use. Much better applied in a lighter car. ART have been very helpful and I have had the shocks rebuilt but I will not and did not reinstall them. I have since made up my own setup with 7" bags and outboard shocks which seems to be much better and a safer alternative with less pressure for the same ride height. Once again, the backup service and communication from ART was excellent, especially after posting the problem on their forum...
EXK, I really have to hand it to you. You have a customer that trusts you and has had you do work before. You explain that this new project he wants is something you do not recommend, and will not do. He takes it elsewhere and does it anyway, then comes back to you to fix it! Not only do you do this, but go to great lengths to make it right. I'd say that this customer is way out of line, and yet you go above and beyond to address his needs. I sure hope he is a customer for life from here on out, and will listen to your expert advice!
Finally installed the rebuilt shock waves with the bigger dia bellows from ART. Now it only requires 55psi fr & 50psi rear at normal ride height. Finally this rivie handles like it should and drives very smooth. But both front shock waves lower mounting bushing already showing signs of fatige. We know this was a probulme area already so we replaced the stock ART soft urathane bushing with a specialy made gl*** filled nylon bushing. The only other choice is to go with a pressed in steel hiem joint. But that in not a option as this car is a daily driver and the hiem will ware out way to fast in an aplcations like this. So the ART shock waves are coming off for good and we are now fabbing up new bag mounts to use std style bags with divorced shocks. Auctuly ART rebuilt the back shock waves and installed bigger bellow for $500.00. We just bought 2 new 8" dia shock waves as It turned out to be cheaper. We also had ART rebuilt the orginal front shock waves for $400.00 with the intent to sell them to offset the price of the new shock waves. IMO ART Shock Waves
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