Air Bags...Which One's??
 

Seen a couple of brands like Firestone and Air Lift. What's a good brand, a good set up to get, and what kind of controller set up do you run?? New subject for me here!!

I vote for the firestone kit. I am real happy with mine :thumbsup:
The kit is fairly easy to install if you have minimal skills. The hardest part for me was finding a location for the compressor and controller.
I also got rid of the "P" series tires and got some LT series load range E tires.

I got it the kit from summit Firestone Ride Rite #FIP2350 and the On Board aircompressor system #FIP2097

Here is a the thread on the system. Also there is more photos of the install in my gallery.. read the comments in the gallery as they have hints from the install.

http://www.f150online.net/forums/sho...ht=voodoochild

They are all compatible.

Air-Lift..... Firestone bags...price is too close to call...which ever you can get easier. If you want the on-board compressor get the Air Lift as it is less than 1/2 the price of the Firestone

But is it half the quality of the firestone? I always worry about skimping on price for that reason.

OK, yeah it is of lower quality, noisey and less powerful, but you don't change pressures once they are set for the load so even the cheaper, lower quality noisey and less powerful will work. If it goes bad you have saved enough to buy another after your lifetime warranty runs out.

I've got the Firestone's without a compressor right now. I'll be installing one in the spring with my train horns :). It took me an about three hours to install them in the driveway. I did have to grind in frame brackets to get them to fit. Other than that the install went well - except for trying to manuever a creeper over an cracked and imperfect asphalt driveway :).

Aaron

So with air bags, you run them empty (of air) with no load and they have zero impact on the ride of the truck...correct??

With a load, you pump them up with a certain amount of pressure to gain the desired lift?? What effect does this have on ride? Are the air bags now working as your shock absorbers?

That's right I run about 10-12lbs. with no load up to about 400 lbs. When I load it up with more I pump the bags up to suit. I use a portable air tank for now, future plans include an onboard compressor. With low pressure the impact on the ride is not noticeable. With higher pressure and more weight the bags do give a little more rebound but I don't find it a problem unless the roads are really rough (ie. washboards). Even with bags washboard roads way still be an issue stock.

No you still need your shocks, the bags are acting like adjustable springs.

Aaron

Firestone recommends that you run a min of 5psi in the bags.

It has very little impact on the quality of the ride at 5psi.... and with that the more air you have in the bags, the harsher the ride will be if you are empty.

George when you get around to putting in the compressor and command center, you will love it. Its not that hard of an install. check out my gallery for pics.

Ya, I'm looking forward to flicking a switch and pumping up the bags.

Keep in mind your empty weight pressure and your loaded weight pressure in the air bags will change. If you have them set t0 40PSI and add 2000#'s of bed weight you might easily now have 80-90PSI in the bags.

Point being adjust the pressure of the bags to the load, don't pre-pressurize the bags for a suspected load or you can get an over pressure situation.

No, it doesn't work like that. 40 PSI is 40 PSI. The volume of the bags is a constant, the temperataure is a constant and so are the number of "air molecules".

The ideal gas law is the equation of state of a hypothetical ideal gas, first stated by Benoît Paul Émile Clapeyron in 1834.

The state of an amount of gas is determined by its pressure, volume, and temperature according to the equation:

pV=nRT
where

p is the absolute pressure [Pa],
V is the volume [m3] of the vessel containing moles of gas,
n is the amount of substance of gas [mol],
R is the gas constant [8.314 472 m3·Pa·K−1·mol−1],
T is the temperature in kelvins [K].

All I can tell you is that when we hook up to our 53' wedge deck on the 1 ton dually we put the air bags at 40PSI and after it is hooked up the air pressure in the air bags is magically at 80PSI. We drop it back down to 40PSI to load the the trailer and after loading the trailer up to 18,000lbs it is magically again at 100PSI.

The compressor is never turned on except for the initial pump to 40PSI before attaching the trailer. Air is only released to lower the pressure.

By the way going over road bumps will temporarily spike the pressure also....magically. I guess I could have a faulty pressure guage that only has bad reading while loading and unloading or going over bumps.;)

I'm not trying to start a pi$$ing match, just observations.

I understand the ideal gas law, but somebody forgot to tell the air suspension.... so something is not a constant. I'm guessing the bag is compressing reducing it's volume increasing pressure.

I'm guessing you are correct, sir. Makes sense to me.

Your right they do compress top to bottom. But the also expand side to side maintaining the overall volume. I have to load a mini excavator into my trailer this afternoon. So I'll take some measurements before and after. Hopefully they'll be the same :).