I have a 2002 4x4 cclb with 35's that rides worse than the dump trucks we own. I bought the truck with 100k on it. Previous owner had a 6" lift installed almost since new. Front is a 10 leaf pack with large rubber bumps and rear is just block. I don't think I can upload pics but would be willing to text them to someone that is willing to upload them.
The problems I have with the truck 1:that the front leafs are sagged out and only ridding about a half inch off the bumps. 2: that with the large blocks in the rear it has bad axle wrap under acceleration.

Lets start with the front first. My plan was to 4 link (5bar) the front and rear and do a full air ride like the kelderman kit. After taking measurements to begin my link build i noticed there is plenty of room up front to just add bags and leave some existing leafs to keep the axle located. The truck sits now with about 12"s between frame and top of axle leaf perch. The front also sits over an inch lower than the rear. So here is my plan. Remove the bottom 6 Leafs (the short ones) and mount an air bag above the remaining 4 main leafs. If i raise the truck up to level I figure i will have plenty of room for an air bag with about a 11 - 12.5" ride height. I am currently thinking of using a goodyear 1r10-089 bag at 12" ride height.

My questions 1) will the remaining leafs be enough to control the axle under hard braking and acceleration? 2) am i along the right lines of thinking this setup will drastically improve my ride quality?

I am open to suggestions on what bags to use if someone has a better option. My reasons for wanting air ride is to be able to lower the suspension to get into my garage and of course to improve the now back jarring ride. Sorry for rambling, after the front is figured out i will go into detail on my planned rear 4 link

 

Subscribing. I've had this idea for awhile now and I already have an onboard air system. Eventually I plan on running a 4link setup front and rear followed by air bags as soon as I figure out a way to mount the four link in the front.

You'll still want to add ladder bars to the rear just be sure you only have one fixed point on the axle. If you make them yourself try to keep the ladder bars on the same angle or close to your driveshaft.

 

If you're wanting to use airbags to raise the level of the truck back up then you need to swap to an air ride suspension. If you put airbags that are meant to help with weight and sagging then you're just going to end up with a worse ride.

When the air bag is used to raise the level of the truck, it's taking away what the spring does and trying to do most of that work itself. The more psi that is put in the bag, the less compression there will be going over bumps unless you have a bunch of additional weight on the truck.

I tried front air bags and ended up throwing them away and buying new springs.

 

Good points Chris.
Let's say the op ditched the springs and decided to 4-link the front still and put air bags in place. That should improve the ride quality ten folds correct? That is the route I was thinking of going. No for the obvious problem if a line let loose there should be a back up in place so the front end doesn't drop.



EDIT: to the OP. I'm curious how you planning on running your 4-link set up in the front. If you have pics or can explain well I would love to hear or see. Pm me if need be thanks

 

4 linked front and rear for sure. Here's a link to Corys build thread when he did just that.

https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...-cadillac.html

 

I have a friend of mine here that 4 linked the front and rear of his truck and put it on full air ride. it rides like a caddy. Just remember that because these truck do make a lot of torque you are going to want a decent size ladder bar on the rear to minimize/stop axle wrap

 

I really like Cory's set up he has. His truck looks like its about the same height as mine is, we even have the same size tires I think when the funds come in ill be doing something very close to what he did.

 

I followed Corey down miles of trail off English Mountain at RRE. That truck looked like a baby buggy soaking up the bumps. The difference in cushion and travel was extremely obvious watching his suspension work compared to the leaf-sprung trucks around him. It works GOOD!

I always wanted to do something like this to my stock-height X - Conti,airlift,ridetech,towing kits

 

If I have to do a 4 link front I will, but my plan is to try the bags over the leafs first and see how it drives.
What are everybody's thoughts on only the leafs locating the front axle? The ride doesn't concern me at the moment (I will go into detail on this in a min) what does concern me is front axle wrap under hard braking.

 

Ok, onto how in my mind the ride should be pretty decent. (sorry this may get long winded)
I have not weighed my axles separately yet (something I plan to do today) but I am just going to guess that my front axle sprung weight is around 4000lbs. The bag I have picked out is a goodyear rolling lobe 1r10-089. This bag is rated for 900 - 5200lb cap. with 14"s of stroke. If I run the bag at a ride height of 11.5"s then at 38psi the bags should generate 2000lbs of lift each and have a spring rate of 315lbs/in. and a ride frequency of 1.25hz. In my opinion this combo should ride pretty nice.

 

Chris - what bags did you try and not like? I am guessing they were just the smaller helper bags guys run in the rear of there truck for load capacity. I do agree that those bags would cause a worse ride.

What I need to do today is measure my front leaves and figure out how much they will change my spring rate. That will give me a much better idea of how the truck will ride.

I guess at this point in time I plan on trying the bags in the front and see if I like them. If I do not like them that bag i have picked out should work real nice in my rear 4 link setup so they wont be wasted.

I am looking over Cory's build right now. looks pretty nice

 

put my truck on the scale and i have 4780lbs on the front and 3060lbs on the rear for a total weight of 7840lbs. That was without me in it and around a half tank of fuel. so my guess of 4000lbs sprung weight for the front is just about right on.

measured the leafs in my truck and ran the calculations to come up with a current spring rate of around 700lb/in That seems kind of high to me
Does anybody have an idea of what a 6" lift leaf springs rate should be? I did some searching and came up with stock V-code leafs are 430lb/in and X-code's are 470lbs/in

 

I have no idea but I like where your going with this thread. Sorry for some of the hijacking I did. Here's a bump

 

Sorry for not spending more time updating this. During the week I work more than I care to admit. John, thanks for the interest and I don't think you did any hijacking. If I decide on linking the front I will post the build.

I remeasured the front lift leave's that are on my truck and redid the math. Came up with a spring rate of 586lb/in. This is a much more believable number. So keeping the 4 main leafs from that pack will generate around 234lb/in and to have a nice soft ride I think I want to stay around 400 -425lb/in. This means that the air bag i add needs to be very soft (less than 200lb/in) using the bag I have listed I can obtain that low of spring rate but I would have to run the bag higher (around 13"s) and I do not think I want the front of the truck that high. I know it is only 1.5"s higher than I originally planned but the problem I run into is the leaf might have to much of an arch in it and the shackle might flip forward. I guess I have to get back outside and do some more measuring.

Does anyone have a way of contracting this Cory? Sounds like he has the geometry and lengths or his links set up very nice. I can try and send him a message but it looks like he isn't very active on here as of late. The questions I have for him is the length and separation of the bars he built. I didn't see those numbers in his build.

 

Hit rat49f6 (JimJam) up. I think he also has the cad program or something that aids in designing this stuff. He built a 6-link with Watts Bar for his SD project 'Swagger'. Look at post #495 https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...thread-33.html