I'm sure the bag fad will fade when something more advanced shows up. The fact that some cars have bags isn't as bad as the bagged cars that "BLOW" up and down all the time. I hate when you see some mini-truck pull up next to you and BLAST his gags at you,like a challenge or something. The guys who like bags so they can park their cars on the frame at shows don't bother me so much. It's the Hotrods with bags that I think are lame. Customs,not so much. It's too much work,to get it the same height and ride,everytime I drive somewhere.
bagging 30's, 40's and 50's will be period correct for y2k in 50 years to future rodders and customizers. haha jk.
I work with a guy who has a 2002 Cadillac,with bags,22" wheels,Lambo doors,15 TV screens,"Coach" interior(don't ask cause I don't know). He has about $65K in the thing. The bags have popped on him twice,and he has bent his wheels three times! He just keeps spending money on it. He has some kind of remote bag switch and gets a kick out of jumping it up at shows to scare people when they are looking at it. LAME!
IMO if you can't live with a low car/truck, then don't build a low car/truck. Who wants "fake" low (low until someone isn't looking). I don't care if you vehicle is low or stock height or anywhere in between, but if you want my respect you better be able to live with what you put out there. OKOK....if you want to bounce along, then set it on the ground for show....well, I suppose you're goin' ta do it, eh? I know I may look a little weak in the intelligence department to "bagger" guy 'cause the bottom of my truck is shiny, or because I have (at 75mph) shaved off asphalt that is squished up in the center....but I don't care. My truck is low, I drive it that way, it's real. I almost always scrape my front bumper crossing a dip. So what. I build it strong. It works. It is what it says it is. What is with this "pretend" shit. You like old time, or customs....then build one and drive it. If you want to "save" your car and don't want to fix anything that gets scraped up while using it, then don't build it low. My rant.
my daily ('00 s-10) is statically dropped 5 inches all around, my custom ('62 buick) is bagged. i love the adjustability of the bags, with mine aired out the car sits on the bumpstops. (keeps the frame about 1/2 inch off the ground) as said before the reliability of a bagged setup is in the design of the installation. think about how things are going to come together and make them safe. my wife drives my buick and a hack installation just wont cut it.
My personal opinion is that regardless if it's bagged or not, I like to see some air between the frame and mother earth. That being said, I've got the Riv lowered (4") with shorter coils for now....but I wanna bag the front. It sits level right now but a wanna bit of a rake to it, and I think if the front is lowered much more statically (is that even a word ?) I'll rip something off. Todd
I'll back up a bunch of people..... Bags on customs=Yes Bags on hot rods=No I like the super low custom look. Not so much on the hotrods We all have what we like and dont. The good news is, theres enough parts out there for us all to build whatever we want and still have stuff around for the next guy.
The only customs I've ever been into date back to the late '50's/early '60's, and while lowering was common, I don't remember much to the extreme that bags would be useful. So I'm not intelligent enough on the customs side to weigh in. But I think bags are a non-issue on rods. Like ABS brakes or GPS, just not a relevant technology to garbage them up with. Like George Carlin says, tho, I could be wrong. But I don't think so.
This hit the nail on the head! Lets be CONSTRUCTIVE with our time people! This seems like a waist of car building time Bagged or not
To quote Ray: as for the look, i don't much care for most of the cars that are stock bodied and slammed, just too cartoonish for my tastes. they should be part of the total package of the look of the car. i do it to get the look i want and be driveable. that doesn't mean i lay it out to park and jack it up like a fuckin DONK to drive like many do. anybody who knows me will tell you my car is never higher than in absolutely necessary to navigate the road without at least a little scraping. it only gets aired up to clear obstacles. His last sentence says it all! If your static ride height is proper and you use the bags to lift the vehicle for clearance on driveways and some roads, good enough. That would have saved the brand new chrome on the bottom edge of my front bumper in Bountiful, Utah a few years ago. Not fun being hung up on a grocery store drive way with a fresh truck. This is an old photo (my daughter is 28 now but no bags on this one and if you look closely you can see the spots on the bottom of the bumper where it got hung up in Utah. I did get a lot of clowns who thought I had hydraulics in it lol. For those of us who do the long distance thing on a regular basis, being able to get the stance where you want it with a loaded trunk/bed or not has an advantage. I'll still never own one that lays the frame on the ground though, hate that look.
you're greatly mistaken if you think bagging a car to accommodate the low stance is "fake" in any way. come on out to colorado springs and play follow the leader with me, the roads in this town WILL leave you hung up! i HAVE driven many thousands of miles on static dropped cars, and in some areas of the country it just doesn't work. your "bounce along and set it on the ground at shows" comment shows that you really don't understand where we are coming from, or how a properly setup air suspension works. unnecessarily beating up your ride ain't cool. you are no more hardcore than anybody with a bagged ride just because your truck scrapes and you don't give a damn. i may not have your respect, oh well, but at least i'll never be the one hung up on a speedbump asking the bewildered and amused bystanders for a shove. it's also nice to be rolling along in traffic and be able to quickly lift your ride to avoid the bad stuff instead of jamming on the brakes or swerving and have a F350 run up your ass.
Sam, your right, in the great majority, when aired out there is no suspension left, but there are workarounds to that. easy to address when it's a clean slate build, not so easy when the bags are used as the means to lower the car. a good way to deal with it is to build the car so it's on the snubbers at the lowest point you want it, but build it so the bags do not need to completely deflate at that height, so that you can bump the pressure up a few more pounds and get an inch of suspension travel at a very low height. this way you are running a higher pressure in the bags at that low height to get a firmer ride and less bottoming out. say you build it to lay out at zero pounds, to get an inch of lift you may only need 40 psi, the ride will be very soft but bottom out easily because of the minimal travel and low pressure. now on the other hand, build it so the bag isn't completely deflated at the lowest height, you can run 60 or 70 psi for example, and at the same ride height bottom out much less than at the lower pressure, because airbags are progressive rate springs. so the guys who use the airbags as the sole means to lower their car generally have to run very little pressure to roll low and still have suspension, an air suspension as part of a total package to lower the car can be built to run a higher pressure/higher spring rate at the same height. make any sense?
it's also nice to be rolling along in traffic and be able to quickly lift your ride to avoid the bad stuff instead of jamming on the brakes or swerving and have a F350 run up your ass. Wellllll.... yeah, but... it would be nice to have climate control, GPS, ABS, auto-dimming headlights, efi when you go hi-altitude to the mountains, etc. I suppose bags might be less of a luxury, tho, if you're going super low and want to leave your driveway, but they just seem a little too much complication to the average rod. Sounds like they might have their place in some circumstances, tho.<!-- / message --><!-- sig -->
Whatchoo calling an alabama lowrider?? You mean there's other ways rather than heating the coils till it hits the stops? I did know one guy (back in the minitruck days) that took his front springs out... I agree with you, i'm partial to the little pages look too. Brian
haha,,whats up Brian,,when i said 'alabama lowrider' im talking about minitrucks... same goes for alll over where non-car people refer to anything lowered as a 'lowrider' but alabama lowrider just sounds funnier,haha
hehehe... kinda like people the guy running for president,,everybody is saying his name wrong ,,its 'Obomba'
Man, I know exactly what you mean... At work (Architecture/Engineering firm) I'm referred to as the guy that drives the lowriders. Well, I don't own a lowrider, as we know them. My daily is a '97 Silverado that's lowered 4/6 and my Galaxie is 'bagged. I don't even waste my time trying to explain that neither vehicle is a lowrider. Of course, I don't need to explain it to the few guys around there that know what a lowrider actually is. Malcolm
to all the closeminded people on this forum......we all like customizing cars,we all do it in different ways, and different styles, we are here to share that love of making our cars different no matter how we do it. And for the record i have used bags and i have used traditional lowering so i understand both ways....i'm not here to judge anyones building style but to see what others are doing. Thanks...
I don't think all vehicles should be bagged and laid low now. They look good hidden under customs, big, slick things... Air bags and hot rods??? Nope. Never. Not me. Nothing looks sillier than a Model A that you can lean on the rear tire before you can the roof. IMO....but, its a free country, right? or IS IT? lol...
who gives a fat fuck,its the individuals choice thats why they are called customs. while we are all trying to be hard compared to some else and show how much knowlege i have compared to who ever,and we like to pour alot of shit on fellow builders,i want my 2 cents..her we go fuck people who do the following.. paint chrome grilles, hate boyd coddington then attend his wake,attach plastic diner plates of fake food on car windows at car shows, think rust is a color,crying dolls,builders who think its still 1984,paint a custom pink,purple or lavendar,giving shit to newbies beacuse you think your hardcore,thinking its 1950 and not 2008 and everything can be traditional and period correct when we all dam well know we all do things that arent traditional , anything else anyone want to add.....come on lets see some other useless shit to talk about,i know how about threads about fridges,girlfriends,fiats,trailers,garages,children,planes,neighbors, AIRBAGS again.you dont like bags dont use them simple yet effective.
The Jalopy Journal
