My 1978 f150 4x4 is equipped with front air shocks. I like them because they level out the front of the truck with the rear, and with about 60psi they ride real nice. One of them has blown out (they are real old looking), and I'm trying to find replacements. I can't find a parts store that sells front air shocks, they only sell rear. The front shocks seem to look the same as a rear shock though. Any suggestions?

 

i have never seen front air shocks, so they are probbly rears. just take one off and see if any one can match it. erv

 

Sounds almost like you've got my old truck. I never saw front air shocks either until I put some on my '79 F150.
I put a large front bumper and PTO winch on the front and added the front air shocks to handle the weight. I also put on air rear shocks, installed an air pump and built a small panel with dual gauges, a selector valve, and a raise and lower button that let me adjust the amount of air in either front or rear shocks on the fly.

No one listed front shocks, so I went to my local NAPA store and found the normal replacement shocks. Then, looked up the specs on them and matched them to a set of air shocks in their catalog. As I remember, everything matched except that the extended length was a little longer.
They were Monroes I think.

However, after a couple of years, I took them off and just replaced the springs with some stronger ones and got the same ride.

The reason was that the air shocks were messing up my front end.
I did not realize it until after I had problems for a while.
I finally figured out what was wrong.
Squat down beside your front tire and study how the suspension is set up.
You have a radius arm which is bolted around the front axle with a bushing and extends back to the frame just in front of the door hinge where it goes through another bushing.
This arm prevents the axle from moving front or back as you go down the road. A coil spring only has strength straight up and so cannot hold the axle that way.
Now, notice that the coil spring is directly over the center of the axle. However, the shock is mounted back a ways towards the end of the radius arm.
As long as the spring is holding up the weight of the truck, the weight is centered over the axle and puts little or no weight on the bushing at the end of the radius arm.
When you use an air shock, and it holds up a large part of the weight of the truck, that weight is applied farther back and puts a heavy downward pressure on the back bushings.
I wore out about 4 sets of bushings before I finally figured out what was going on.

The good part was, with my big winch, I could take the nut off the arm, run the cable through a block and winch the axle straight forward until the arm cleared the bracket and then put on the new bushings.
I supported the arm with a floor jack, and when I had the bushings on, I let the winch back slowly and eased the arm back into place.
After I weighed the bumper and winch, did the math to convert a weight that was out front to its equivalent over the axle and replaced the springs with a set that were that much stronger, I threw the shocks away and went with regular ones.

Never had to replace the bushings again and still had a great ride.

J.

 

MY Lord thank you for that long reply! :-) I actually talked to a local NAPA guy today and he even went out to look at my truck. He said TAKE THEM OFF IMMEDIATELY. He said same things as you have just stated: will wear out parts with pressure, and can be unsafe. He recommended a 1.5'' spring lift, otherwise known as a "plowing coil", and lift shocks to match the 1.5 lift. That will get rid of the front-end dive and he claims with a good set of gas shocks it be like night and day compared to air. I will probably go that route. I'm sick of people looking at me funny when I say I have front air shocks lol