Air bag instead of coil over?

Thanks man
Yep..they are, not a scratch on em..never been used on a car according to the previous owner, and i dont doubt his word looking at them..heck i cant even see or tell if they had ever even been compressed at one time or another..the bushings are even perfect

 

sorry guys i dont know how to multi quote...im too old to learn that new trick right now

I will do my best to keep you updated, I hope to put the car on the road this summer..well at least thats the plan

and i havent ruled out the strut bag deal i showed..it has its possibilities..

if these end up sucking, i will give em a try

 

really? are we gonna beat that dead horse again?

anyways. my dad put bags for an s10 on the rear of his 38 plymouth sedan to control ride height when he was pulling his 31 foot travel trailer all over the midwest. the car would sit at the same height wether or not the trailer was on it. he had a small on board compressor for it. works great.
plus , i'd rather have a car that can look cool, and i can put my kids, dogs, coolers, and swap meet deals in without worrying about bottoming out. ''traditional'' or not.

 

I hope they don't end up sucking they are the same ones I have.

 

Preach on Brother Fink, I totally agree with what you have to say.

Why not try to improve this hobby instead of trying to keep it the same old way. As for you so called "Traditional Guys" this is an era that happened 60+ years ago it evolved for a reason quit trying to revive an era that died decades ago.

 

I have the same units on my A Tudor and think they work well. It rides like any other A I've driven. Certainly not like a Caddy, but not bone jarring either.

 

Good to hear.

 

God i hope not too

 

i had a pair of coil overs on the rear of my hot rod,that is street driven and taken to the drags once in a while, i switched them out for shockwaves,not for slamming purposes but because i wanted a little ride height adjustment and a better ride,they bolted right in no fab work needed. i love them if you dont use an air system,valve them seperatly , because if they are Td together when you go around a corner the weight of the car will force the air into the other air bag,causing an exagerated roll,,,,,,oh and the air bag traditional thing has been settled on here more than once they have been used forever.

 

Von, You need to think of the air bag as a spring. That has a rate determined by the load it has to support. Lets say the back of the car weighs 1000# and lets assume the shocks are standing up 90* to the ground and on the axle so that each spring is supporting 500#. If the bag has a 5" dia the support area is about 15 sq. in. . 500#/15= 33.3 psi.

Now, if you want to raise the car, you need to add volume, not pressure. because all you are doing is raising up the same weight just to a different height. So the ride stiffness will stay the same at different heights because the pressure is the same, just the volume of air in the bag is different.

You would like to keep the normal ride height near the center range of the bag/shock so that you don't bottom out in either direction.

When you add the kid, dog and cooler, then the pressure will be higher to support the additional weight.

If you use a metal valve stem cap, the kind that has the rubber gasket inside, you should not have problems even if the valve stem leaks a little.
If you are going to carry a spare tire, you could always use that for your air supply on the road if the system leaks a little and needs to be topped off.

 

I say go with bags! I've been tossing around the idea for my '31 coupe hot rod...all my "customs" have bags

 

Well I did score a new set of coil overs..i couldnt pass up the price and the fact they were new and unused..
I am going to give them a shot..
The money I saved on buying these, will put me in a good position if they turn out to be a big PITA, and not the ride i want..
I will have saved enough $$ on them that making the transition to bags wil be worth it if needed..who knows I could set it up to use one or the other depending on my needs..
again, if these suck. I will definetly give the bag shock a shot at it..
I am after a good ride, this is going to be a road car..not a track car, so ride, and comfort is of top priority.
I will keep you all posted as to what i think or feel when the time comes to put her on the road.

 

Hey Randy, those look like nice coilovers!

We put Air Ride Tech's Shockwaves on the back of the '32... we have about 5000 miles on it from August 1 to early October. They are nice because once you get them dialed in, the ride is exactly how you want it to be. A not-so-nice thing about them is it's sometimes hard to get them the same as you had them when you did like it! I've been doing a lot of thinking on air bag pressure (or "air spring" as Air Ride is trying to get people to call them). I personally would not be happy with an air bag car if I had to visit a service center every time I wanted to change the pressure. I'm wondering if there's a common theme between people who say "air ride never rides nice" and the people who fill their bags with a shrader valve at the gas station. You just can't fine tune the pressure as much as you can with an in-car air management system. I had to put fittings with itty bitty holes in them in the exhaust ports because the pressure would drop too fast for me to be able to control it. I have electric switches, so with manual valves I imagine it would be easier to let out just a bit of pressure.

The ride quality difference between say 75 psi and 85 psi is surprisingly enormous. I would never have thought it could be so drastic. I drove the car to Louisville and back last year (a day after we drove it for the first time) so I'd say I've had some adequate experimenting time.

The other thing I question is how much bleeding would happen between the driver and passenger wheels in an air system where the two sides are connected with a tee fitting. I'm thinking of an off ramp where the car leans to one side. It seems the air would be pushed out of the outside bag and into the inside corner bag.

I think that's about all I've got for now

 

Hey WS..or DW..lol

thanks for your in-put..those are exactly the ones i was looking at ..

My plan was to not tie them into a Tee..and adj them seperately..
with a transverse spring up front and the possibility of body roll in corners I felt having them set up seperately was the best way..
thanks for the insight into that..
I was not planing on running an on board compressor..or if i di it was going to be a small 12 volt electric one with seperate valving for each..

I will give the coil over deal a shot..but i wont put up with a rough ride..so time will tell if they make the grade

 

I think there are good installs and poor installs of every type of suspension... just like welding - a good stick weld is "better" than a poor tig weld.

If you're thinking of not running a compressor, I'd at least hook a tank in there somewhere that you can fill at a service station... I think you need to be able to add/dump little bits of air to fine tune the ride.

The first few times my dad drove the '32, he had already bought coilovers in his mind to replace the shockwaves... it was that bad. By the end of the season, he was happy with them.

 

wheres the shocks n the middle pic of the rod? those dont look like shock wave style bags or am i wrong ?

 

Has it been enough time yet? Any updates?

 

naw..still building the car, but it sits right, and bouncing around in the car while fitting things and building it feels right. I have a bit of a ways to go before the first road test.

 

Just a bump for this topic.
The main reason people will get a bad ride from an airbag from my experience, is they dont have the "ride height" set properly. Ride height for the front is a little different. Mainly because the "ride height" is so much more critical. If using shockwaves, there is a recommended right height for the best ride quality. You also need to set everything up at ride height for front end alignment, caster, camber etc. All of AirRideTechnologie's bags have recommended ride heights. If you set your application up using their numbers and data, you should be happy with the ride. I am not familiar with any other manufacturers brand, however, knowing what I know about air ride, there is a "Sweet spot", or ride height recommendation for all of them.

If you do not use an onboard compressor, and just use schrader valves, teeing the rears together is not ideal. The air will transfer to either side when body roll ensues.

 

I have never had a customer have a good ride from Shockwaves, unless they were on a particularly light car, irrespective of ride height. The air bladder is just too small for a larger car. Every set that came through my shop, I ended up removing, in favor of a conventional bag.

If you are fabricating the setup, there is little-to-no-point running a a bag-over-shock. They are just too damned expensive for what you get.

With a separate bag, you can choose a size that is more appropriate for the weight of your car. Not so with a Shockwave, or similar.

Most often, when I find a air ride equipped customer car with an unacceptable ride quality, it is due to the wrong size bag, in addition to possibly the wrong ride height.

Most recently, I have seen a '63 Riviera, with 6" bags in the front (Nail Head equipped, still). They need to be pumped to 120psi to keep the car at ride height. Needless to say, it rides like it has no front suspension. These should be 7's or even 8's if they can be crammed in there.

Oh, and for the record, I have bags on the back of my '29A. Separate valves (for body roll control), small tank and compressor.

 

Well I put about 60 miles on them so far, they need a bit of adjustment but so far feel right. I need to buy the spanner wrench to tighten up or losen the preload on the springs, but other than that they are pretty close.
predampner set at about 1/2 way

 

What pressure are you running them at?

 

I've never seen one that had them but an air ride suspension was an option on 58 ford Fairlanes. Seen the literature never the hardware.

 

if this was directed at me , I went coil over..

250# springs

 

Traditional is relative. This board has a definition, relatively. It is not the only one, but it is the only one we're supposed to be talking about here, traditionally.

 

Must have missed that. Worked really late last night, coffee not working.

250#? How is the ride? Stiff? I'd have thought that to be on the high side, but who knows....

 

well to be honset i bought them used, i believe i was told 250, but i have them all the way loose, and 1/2 predamp..and they seem ok, i have a 32 tank (15 gallon) out back , that might make a difference, also they are on a bit of an angle too..

they could be 200's or 220's..they are black if that means anything

 

they will bottom out occationally but i dont have much travel either.(.They dont bottom out, my axle does)
it kinda rides like a hot rod..very sure footed..a go-cart on steroids

 

If you can tell me the diameter of the coil (I.d.), the diameter of the wire itself, and the number of full turns, I can tell you the spring rate. That way you'll know for sure.

 

Sounds great, I'll have to get with you on that, I plan to blow the car apart this fall for paint., but i should be able to get a good look up there and maybe get close to getting good enough measurements
Im out driving the shit out of it every chance i get