wannadiesel

The front of the leaves act like trailing arms, and the rear shackles are mounted to the air ride swing arm.

Chuck, are the shackle mounts on your setup independent of each other? The Keldermann setup avoids body lean by having the shackle mounts tied together.

u.s mma

I have a hard time with that, not calling you a liar by any means, but it seems at least on my truck that with the bag aired down that the rear end sags way to much, then say with 4k in the bed, she is really, really squated. With the bottom connecting bar, shackle to shackle, I don't see how the the bag would pivot. I have seen huge loads in this truck, bag allways aired up, and have had zero issues.

Kenny D

I have no pics but basicly it supports the rear leaf spring eylets. So when the bags go up and down so do the leafs. So technicly you can still overload the leafs but if you stay within those limits its real nice

Hope that helps you man

chuck'64

Yes the shackle mounts are tied together at the front by the 2x3 angle and at the pivot by a piece of 3/8" x 1.5" flat stock. It is a lot better with the bags aired up but then it rides rougher.

I still think that a rear sway bar would help a great deal. Does anybody know how hard it would be to make a 2nd gen sway bar fit??


Here is a pic of the rear pivot point all the brackets were cut from 1/2" plate and the rod ends are forged steel with 1"-8 threads.

whereswaldo250

I was looking at kelderman's front bag system for the 4x4 trucks and it looks like a nice upgrade. With the rear suspension it looks like you have to move the spare tire, correct? Also does the kelderman rear set up come in contact with the exhaust pipe? In other words do you have to reroute the exhaust? This is getting me thinking...

Philip

U.S. the bag wouldn't pivot. The body would pivot on the bag. A weak spring pack or a off centered load could cause it. It would cause an ocalating type of body roll.

rbertalotto

Why can't we simply remove a few leaves from the rear springs and install a Firestone Air Bag system? Wouldn't this smooth out an unloaded truck?

wannadiesel

Hellwig makes a rear sway bar for our trucks.

u.s mma

Chuck, that is a cool design. Phil, I see what you are talking about, but personally haven't dealt with it. Again, does anyone know if the various bag shapes affect ride or load capacity, ie single, double convolute, or Like the one free89w350 has, like the big rigs?

BearKiller

Did you not type enough zeros ??; surely those are good for 35,000-pounds each.


That is some pretty good engineering you have done there.


Those appear to be standard issue bags with many applications.

I recommend you have a couple extras in the tool-kit for when one of those gets snagged; they are not very expensive brand-new.


We are all the time having to replace them on account of, when an inside tire blows, it usually takes out one or both bags on that side; with the right size wrenches, it is at most a fifteen-minute job, so long as the air-line didn't also get damaged.


I prefer leaf-spring suspension on big trucks on account of my above statement in BLUE; a blow-out is bad enough to handle, let alone the whole side of the truck suddenly listing badly to the already burdened side; that has been the cause of many a wreck.

chuck'64

Thank you I spent days thinking about it and weeks drawing it up in solidworks
I am sure that the bags could handle that load, I just took the information off the tag axle that they were on originally.

Richie O

Can't be 35,000 each. I run my triaxle lift axle at 90 to 100 pounds and I only weigh around 70,000 max. That would pick up my whole truck. That doesn't happen.

Ace

Here's how I put a 2nd gen swaybar on mine. You obviously have the fab skills. Pretty simple, and works well:

http://stuff.is-a-geek.net/PhotoAlbu...ics/CDT_25.jpg
http://stuff.is-a-geek.net/PhotoAlbu...ics/CDT_26.jpg
http://stuff.is-a-geek.net/PhotoAlbu...ics/CDT_27.jpg
http://stuff.is-a-geek.net/PhotoAlbu...cs/CDT_160.jpg

whereswaldo250

Does anybody have one of these on their truck? How is the quality of hellwig products?

Ace

Hellwig makes great stuff, but it's a bit spendy for my wallet.