Air Ride

You know, one of the unique things about trucks is they look really good, jacked up in the air, big tires, four wheel drive

and they also look good, slammed down on the ground for a hot rod street truck. Look, now today's show is for you street truck guys that wanna be able to drop your truck down into the weeds for when you're cruising,

but also raise it back up for normal driving. That way you can deal with potholes and speed bumps, things like that. But at the same time, you wanna be able to keep a nice smooth ride.

Yep. Talking about airbags and today I'm

gonna show you how to install a killer system first. Let's take a look at the victim.

This is a 98 S 10 and it's pretty typical of what you'd find on any car lot across the nation or in your buddy's yard.

And as you can see, it's already got some custom touches done to it.

You got your A PC tail lights and it's got nitrous on it. That's cool. Got a Trends grill and various billet pieces inside

and it already has a mild suspension drop. But

we are gonna take it to the next level with air bags and a wheel and tire combination. So, if you think it looks good, now,

hold on to your shorts because you're not gonna believe the difference this is gonna make.

All right, let's take a look at the kit we're gonna use in the rear. Now, this is from air ride technologies and they call it the air bar. Now, this basically converts your leaf spring rear suspension to a three link. Now, if you don't know what that means, I'll explain it to you as I install it.

Now, this kit includes new upper and lower cross members, brackets your link bars, hardware,

air spring shocks, everything you're gonna need to put this in.

Now, a couple things worth noting here,

the air bar will give you up to eight inches of drop with a flick of a switch.

You do not have to cut your frame and put in ac notch.

You do not have to cut your bed for clearance. There's no welding, there's no fabricating. This is a bolt in kit.

Now, I know a lot of you are probably looking at this going.

Uh

I don't know, man, there's a lot of stuff here.

It's not that difficult and I'm gonna prove it to you.

The first thing we'll do is get this thing up in the air and lose those embarrassing stock wheels and tires.

Then we'll support the rear axle with the jack

and disassemble everything.

So

finally we'll remove the stock leaf springs and toss it all in the junk pile.

Ok. One part that does need to be cut off is this bump stop bracket. So our axle will have enough clearance to move up in there

and don't get nervous. This is still very simple. What we've got is a weld that runs all the way around the perimeter of this bracket. And what we'll do is take a cut off wheel

and just cut to the inside of that weld here on the bracket. That way the bracket will just fall out of the way. Then we'll go in with the grinder grind down that weld. You'll never know that bracket was there.

Next, we'll just bolt the lower cross members to the rear axle using the supplied U bolts.

The next piece we're gonna put on is this upper link bracket that bolts right to the rear end housing.

Now, for your emergency brake cables, all you'll do is come in, cut this piece off and then this will slide down into the stock location, be held in place with that bolt. You'll also need to modify your brake line.

So this bracket will bolt right here. Then your brake lines will be out of the way. Now, while I'm at it, I'm gonna come up here disconnect this brake hose, take off this bracket to make room for our new cross member.

The next piece to go on. Is this upper cross member? Now, it's got places for the shocks to mount, got a relocation tab for your brake line and then of course your air springs.

Now it slides right over the top of the stock exhaust system

and then indexes right where your stock shocks used to bolt,

then just drill your frame rails and bolt it on

to mount the front of the upper link. You've got this two piece bracket

and it slides right over the gas tank cross member here. So first we'll unbolt that emissions module

and then the bracket, just clam shells right over the cross member and bolts into place.

Now, this bracket is self aligning because it's got a pin that goes up into an existing hole here into the cross member and that way you cannot mess up the alignment.

Now, notice I've relocated this emissions canister from this location

over to here with a little handmade bracket.

All right. Now we are ready for the link bars themselves and these are what hold the rear end in place. Now, first, we're gonna start with this upper link. This is a triangulated piece. As you can see, it's already got the factory style rubber bushing installed to give you a lot of years of trouble free driving.

Now to install them,

they just slide into the already installed brackets,

the lower links, they just slide into place, utilizing these old leaf spring brackets in the front

and

the new lower cross member here in the rear. All right.

Now, I'm gonna talk you through a three link. Now, obviously, you've got three links, you've got your two lower links.

You've got your upper link which is triangulated.

And these links all work together to keep this rear end from moving forward and back side to side or rotating up and down,

which can change your opinion, angle or cause wheel hop. Now, you still have movement of the axle though for when you hit bumps and driving down the road. Now, look at this,

you can see how far this axle is gonna tuck up under this truck. Matter of fact, it will lay the frame right down on the axle. You cannot go any lower unless you put in ac notch.

Now, one last thing, all these parts come from air ride all preset. So your opinion angle is exactly where it needs to be. You just put them in,

forget about

it.

Hey, welcome back to trucks.

What I'm doing today is putting an air ride system on a 98 S 10 so we can slam it down in the weeds when we want to

and then raise it back up when we have to.

But I'm not just putting on air bags. No, no, I've actually completely converted the leaf spring rear suspension

to a three link. Now, the last pieces to put on which I did during the break. Are the air springs themselves and the shocks. Now notice they just bolt into place between the two cross members making this a really slick really clean bolt on installation.

Now, this takes care of the rear.

Let's get to the front.

Now, if you think this is a big pile of junk that came off the rear,

wait till you see what's coming off the front. Everything, matter of fact, the only parts we're gonna reuse are this rotor and caliper, which means the spindle coming off the lower control arm, spring shocks, upper control arm, it's all got to go because we are putting on much better stuff. So grab your tools, Ken, start the music. Here we go.

Now you do not need to use a spring compressor to get the coil spring out of an S 10.

Just put a jack under the lower control arm, jack it up, put tension on the spring. That way you can take out the spindle. Then when you're ready to take the spring out,

just lower, the jack

still need to be careful though.

Now that I've got this thing all torn apart. Most of the original suspension and a pile on the floor. It's time to take a look at some of the new stuff we're gonna put on.

Now, just like the rear, this front kit is also from air ride technologies and it's gonna make your s 10 handle like a sports car. Now we started with their cool ride airbags, shocks added two inch drop spindles and then finished it off with the super cool tubular upper and lower control arms. And these already have bushings installed ball joints and they're engineered for extreme suspension travel. Now, the first piece we're gonna put on are these new shock mountain brackets?

These relocate your shocks from the inside of the spring pocket to the outside of the control arm. Now, putting these on just a matter of drilling three holes and bolting them on.

Next, we need to make some room in the spring pocket here for the airbag to fit, which means this whole area has got to be cut out. Now,

I'm gonna use a plasma cutter but a Sawzall or a cut off wheel will work just as well

just a little slower.

What you're after here is about a half inch of clearance all the way around the bag.

Now, a good rule of thumb is that if you can get your hand around that bag,

you've got enough clearance. Now, all you have to do is just bolt it in. No, but wait, wait, stop before you bolt it in. You need to make sure and run your airline

because once you get that bag bolted in,

you don't have access to that air fitting. Now notice I've also split some rubber fuel line and put it over the airline

that'll protect the airline as it comes up through the pocket

the new upper and lower control arms are next and they just bolt into the stock locations.

Follow that with the new spindle and shock and we're about ready to put air to this thing, which is exactly what we're gonna do

after the break.

Welcome back to trucks. We've got our new air ride suspension installed on this S 10. Now, let's take a look at the air system.

This kit comes from air Ride technologies and you can see it has the compressor which fills the five gallon tank which in turn sends air down to the four air valves and they send air to the four air bags.

Then you have all your wiring and hoses to hook it up.

Now, the guys at Air Ride technology set this board up for us because this is the way they recommend you set it up in your truck. Now, this board does not come with your kit, but it's a good idea. So let's take a look at what they did

started out with a piece of three quarter inch plywood,

cut it to size and then they just put a piece of stainless over it. Then they mounted all the components down on that.

Then the whole assembly will bolt right into the bed of your truck. You've got easy access to it

and it looks really good.

This is a good idea.

Now, how are we gonna control this system? Oh, you're gonna love this, this is brand new from air ride and it's called the Ride Pro E. Now, this allows you to control your airbags from inside the rig with this little push pad

or from outside with these remotes and it's got all kinds of other features. Now, I know this looks like a lot of stuff, but no, now this is very simple plug in hook ups. This is state of the art. Cool.

The last thing we need to put on are some wheels and tires and these are what are gonna give your truck it's personality.

So for tires, we went to NTO got a set of these nt 555 extreme ZR tires.

Now, these are an awesome performance tire.

Now, the size on the front is a 2 35 40 18

on the rear is a huge 2 75 35 18. Now, the only way that you can use a tire, this big

is if your rim size and back spacing is exactly where it needs to be.

So for rims, we went to billet specialties

got a set of the super trick SLX 40 fives. Now, these are based off of a five spoke design, but

they've got to look all their own.

Now, the size on the rear

18 by 10

size on the front 18 by eight.

Now, billet specialties not only build some of the tricks wheels in the business,

but they'll also custom build your back space exactly where you need it to be. So, you know, these are gonna fit

and speaking of fit,

let's take a look at the way that body tucks down over those new wheels.

Yeah, that's the way this truck is supposed to look.

Now, how low will it go?

Well, the air bar will put your frame about three inches off the ground,

but probably the coolest thing about this whole project is this

because now you can step back

when somebody starts to take a look at your truck, you can literally make it come alive

and really blow their mind.

Now, you can have some serious fun with this thing.

Now, how difficult is this project? Really?

Well, this is technically a bolt in kit, but that does not mean that it's for beginners. Now, we're gonna put it about halfway up our difficulty meter because you need to have some basic mechanical skills here. You need to know how to do your brakes, you need to know how to extend a brake line. You need to know how to do wiring properly.

And of course, you need to have the proper tools, but as you can see,

the end results are well worth it. We will see you after this.

One thing that all new diesel trucks have in common is they have a turbo sitting under the hood, not a super charger.

The reason is turbo is very efficient and builds a lot of power. Now, how is that possible. Well, we're gonna show you

how it works is brought to you by Wyotech.

All right. What we've got here is a Dodge Cummins diesel turbo sitting on top of it and just as a refresher, here's what's going on. Got your exhaust coming out here entering the turbo inside the turbo. You have this twin impeller exhaust spins this side and then exits out here,

this side sucks air in,

rolls it around, compresses, it blasts it into the intake for extra power. Now, what is this? And what is a waste gate? What do they do?

Well, Randy, that's the question. What's an actuator and a waist gate? And what do they do?

The actuator is a spring loaded diaphragm inside this housing

that reads turbo boost pressure on the intake side.

When boost pressure reaches a certain level, it pushes on this rod which rotates this valve

to open this passage

to allow the exhaust gasses to bypass the turbine wheel

and go out the exhaust. So it doesn't increase boost past a certain point. So it basically controls your boost.

So if you don't, you don't build too much boost and when you build boost, you build heat, right? So how do you control that?

Well, if it's a non electronic engine, you can control it with your foot, you can just let off the gas, let off the fuel. But how does it, how does a driver know when he's getting too hot? If he has a Pyro Meer gauge,

then he can read temperatures,

read from a sensor

in the exhaust. Now say the driver ignores the pyro

Meer gauge. What does that equal

money?

So you can melt the turbo down?

These things are capable of doing that, they're capable of doing that or pistons or other engine parts. Now to mount the

petter gauge,

you've got a couple choices,

you got your exhaust manifold prior to the tur

turbo

and also the exhaust pipe after the turbo, which is the best.

It varies with the application. If it's a pulse manifold which allows individual cylinder flow

to the turbo, then you don't have a choice. You have to mount it after the turbo.

If uh if you mount it in a manifold like this,

the temperatures will be higher, but it will be more sensitive to changes. Uh The bad thing is that if the, if anything happens and it breaks, that

goes through the turbo

dru

end of engine, all

kind

of stuff. Well, hopefully that gives you an idea what you can do to a turbo to tweak some more boost out of it

and just like anything else you can do it if you know how it works.

You know, when you start adding accessories to your truck, like lights and stereos and winches. Well, you need a battery that's stronger than stock and that is where this optima yellow top deep cycle battery comes in.

Now, this not only gives you more power but it recovers quicker than just about anything you're gonna find out there.

Now, I add to that completely sealed maintenance, free case

that you can mount in any configuration.

And you've got the reasons why you'll see more optimus on race tracks and car shows across the nation than any other performance battery.