Air Ride on an expo vehicle?

[zelseman]

It goes back to your definition of overlanding. We drive a lot of paved and unimproved roads with a lot of washboard and dirt with very little "off-roading". We use our 2WD vehicle to get to remote areas to mountain bike, camp, hike, paddle, or otherwise enjoy nature. We want to be able to basecamp somewhere off-grid and air bags have helped us get there a little easier.

We have noticed much less sway and no decrease in ride quality over worn out stock springs. We also got 1-2 inches of "lift".

 

[LocalmotionSC]

It goes back to your definition of overlanding. We drive a lot of paved and unimproved roads with a lot of washboard and dirt with very little "off-roading". We use our 2WD vehicle to get to remote areas to mountain bike, camp, hike, paddle, or otherwise enjoy nature. We want to be able to basecamp somewhere off-grid and air bags have helped us get there a little easier.

We have noticed much less sway and no decrease in ride quality over worn out stock springs. We also got 1-2 inches of "lift".

Out of curiosity are your airbags on your short bus? And by airbags are you referring to a full air suspension or 'helper' air bags in the rear? Skoolies are what originally got me thinking about an air ride suspension. In those circles (non-overlanding, mostly highway driving, occasional forest road driving, school bus owners) air bags seem quite sought after.

 

[RAM5500 CAMPERTHING]

Lots of opinions on this, some valid, some complete BS. Everyone is entitled to their opinions of course.

Big rigs wouldn't be hauling massive loads on our freeways if airbags were problematic and unsafe.

It all boils down to quality of product, quality of installation, and proper usage.

If you slap some $200 helper bags on your $75k+ setup, ya can't expect magic. If you slap a $6-7k self leveling full air system with sensors, compressors, etc.. ya can't expect at least some of those moving parts to fail at some point.

Limited articulation is a very valid comment, no way around it, it limits your travel.

Almost all complaints you see about bags are from leaks in the fittings. Again, install issue..

I've had bags on my last 3 trucks (100 series land cruiser, and 2 tundras) and probably close to 30k of dirt use between all of them with not a single issue because i am meticulous with my installs and keep it simple and basic.

I'm about to start a build on a Ram 5500 Camperthingamcbob and will be using the Kelderman system (2 stage, not the full 4 link).

However, all of the added nonsense of sensors, self leveling, compressors, switches, is just more points of possible failure. My entire install will be as basic as it gets with manual fill schrader valves, ive ran it like this on my last 3 trucks and not a single glitch. Kelderman has been around 20+ years, if the stuff didnt work, they wouldnt be around, simple. WIth some miles under your belt, you'll eventually find the happy pressure on pavement, and the happy pressure for dirt. Id be airing my tires up or down per the conditions, and i'll be doing the same with my suspension.

There is no cut and dry answer, its all dependent on your needs. I am past the stage of rock crawling and being extreme. I just want max comfort tuned to my liking.

I've had 3 sets of custom leaf springs made by very reputable spring companies in the last 4 years that were absolute trash, and wasted a ton of time, money, and headache. A few get lucky and get it nailed from the get go, but that is quite rare nowadays.

For those saying leaf springs are tried and true and fool proof... In all my years of offroading, i've seen a fair amount of leaf spring failures, center pins shearing, ubolts breaking, main leaf actually snapping, etc... All of which required a crap load of downtime to get moving again.

Everything breaks, fact.. Determine what your needs are and install it as best as possible, NOTHING is fool proof, and NOTHING is bulletproof.

Oh, and you can stuff a spare air bag in your storage comparment alot easier than a leaf spring

My .02

 

[RAM5500 CAMPERTHING]

But many medium and heavy duty vehicles come with an air ride suspension, some of which would make good base vehicles for a mild/moderate expo vehicle. Its these cases that led to my question.

Manufacturing engineers occasionally know a tad more about what works than random folks on the intaweb, just saying!

 

[RAM5500 CAMPERTHING]

Any suspension as only as good as the guy that designed it. Unfortunately there are a lot of bolt on air ride kits that are very poorly designed. Changing ride height with pressure is a bandaid. Changing pressure to account for I differing loads is a god send.

Bingo

 

[RAM5500 CAMPERTHING]

Yeah, these were kind of my concerns (easy serviceability and potential fragility of the system--but i've only got no idea how fragile or resilient airbags are). I don't plan to do any rockcrawling and I won't be taking this build on any RTW expeditions (Mexico is about as far as I'll ever get I imagine), but these factors are still relevant concerns I think. I do imagine that finding a shop that will service airbags for a medium/heavy duty truck chassis would be easier to find than shops that could source parts or do so for a Range Rover, and its possible that these systems would be simpler/more resilient too, but on the other hand they might be more vulnerable offroad as they were not designed with that in mind. But all in all, it feels like it might be best to avoid if your primary consideration is resilience and serviceability. The adjustability does sound damn nice though.

Out of curiosity, what is the procedure for fixing a busted airbag on the trail?

There is really very little to service or maintain with a bag system if you arent running all the fancy sensors, and such..

A good quality heavy duty replacement firestone bag is around $200+/-, a 10ft length of air hose is around $20. You can easily carry both in your rig without taking up much real estate. For most setups ive seen and dealt with, replacing a bag would be about a 15 min job, tops.

Now picture yourself stuck somewhere with a busted leaf spring or ubolt and think how easily that could be fixed on a trail... Its all preference

 

[zelseman]

Out of curiosity are your airbags on your short bus? And by airbags are you referring to a full air suspension or 'helper' air bags in the rear? Skoolies are what originally got me thinking about an air ride suspension. In those circles (non-overlanding, mostly highway driving, occasional forest road driving, school bus owners) air bags seem quite sought after.

They are helper springs and they are on our short bus. Points still stand. They seem pretty popular and most folks are happy with them.

 

[nitro_rat]

No way I would go with schrader valves. Plenty of reliable compressor set ups available. Get a load leveling valve (like the big rigs use) and set it up right. Almost all of the big OTR air ride systems are air-over-leaf!!!

 

[RAM5500 CAMPERTHING]

No way I would go with schrader valves. Plenty of reliable compressor set ups available. Get a load leveling valve (like the big rigs use) and set it up right. Almost all of the big OTR air ride systems are air-over-leaf!!!

Why not? Used them on 3 different rigs that saw lots of abuse without a single issue. If im out of the truck adjusting the tires, i'll be adjusting the suspension too. What so you determine to be "set up right?" and why?