I guess this is more geared towards the guys on air, which are few and far between here, but any truckers are welcome to chime in.

this morning (12 degrees i might add) i went out and started my truck, let it warm up, and went to fill the airbags, but nothing. I know its the condensation in the lines, but is there a better way to stop it from freezing? Someone already warned me to run DOT air brake anti-freeze.

 

Other then the air brake anti freeze theres really nothing else I know of. On our big trucks we have air dryers that take 99 percent of the moisture out and then if we have any problems we run the deicer in our lines, you might try a air dryer?

 

You need to pull the drain cord on your air tanks daily. If you don't have them on your truck, look for a pitcok and drain it. This should be done daily in winter months, weekly in warmer months. Use airline dryer at the line right off the compressor, and work it back to the tanks. Install a air dryer if you don't have one. If you do, it might need to be rebuilt. Get it to a warm shop and do some maintenance....

 

You should be able to get away with just draining your tanks, once a day, or once every two days. I'd carry some DOT Brake Anti Freeze too, don't use straight Methyl Hydrate, it drys out all the rubbers in your air system. Just carry the Brake Anti Freeze and the tools to take the line from your compressor off, and you'll always be safe to unfreeze your system if you have too. I've never heard of anyone making an air dryer for a light truck application.

 

I'd advise investing in a water/oil trap as well. I never used one, for the last 4 years; but I'm in Cali and I generally only drive it when the weather is cool. Nonetheless, I just ordered one to be installed since my truck is in the shop.

I'm not sure what you can do about a frozen valve. Big rigs apparently have mechanisms to help address that; according to this link:

Tricks For Fixing Frozen Air Systems


Suicide Doors Water-Oil Trap

 

Calistyle is on the right track, if your air system works properly even on the big trucks you should never need airline antifreeze. What I would do is go to home depot and get an oil water separator. They work on shop airlines for air tools and you will go through way less air. Its $24 bucks and would be very easy to tie into your system between the compressor and tank.
It looks like this, and you would only have to drain it when its full....if your lucky when you get your oil changed...

 

there is one other way to eliminate all problems of this sort

nitrogen

but like others said get a water separator and drain it offten, or get nitrogen(no more waiting for preassure)

 

Up were I work and live you need air brake anti freeze in a big truck no matter how good your air system is working. We run a Sniffer on our trucks, it gives off a bit of Antifreeze into the air system every time the compressor produces air. I don't know if you could rig one onto the air system for a bagged truck, but that would do the trick.

If it was me I would use the shop air compressor water seperator just like suggested above. I never even thought about that, thats a good idea.

 

i've been thinking of running the water seperators, but they never really worked on the shop compressor for me. i ran the air brake conditioner the other night, but it hasn't really been cold enough to freeze. i pulled the plug at the bottom of the tank (5 gallon) and got about a soda cans worth of water out...

 

I didn't read the original thread to closely, or it just didn't register that it was for a bagged 150. On your system, i would just bleed the water out of the tanks every couple of days. if you use a water/oil seperator type of dryer that is pictured in the above post, make sure you drain it daily, because it can freeze and posssibly break.

 

I still support a dryer/filter to cut all problems and save your valves