jimbo74

My truck is lifted in the rear somewhat... about 2" currently via shackles with plans of an soa and modified leaf pack in the future employing some of my ford explorers leaf pack.....

there are no comercially available air shocks for my truck. now i want to get some to help out with loads etc and offroad performance. i have heard here about crosslinked air shocks... what does this mean? meaning they share an airline between them or what? also what size would i be getting? i have also looked into just longer shocks that are sold in sizes that only deall with extension/compression lengths... how can i accurately tell what would be suited for my truck?

SoCal4Running

I dont thing the words air shock and off-road performace can be used in the same sentance.
Air shocks are a waste of money, shock mounts are not meant to support vehicle weight not to mention they ride like crap

To help out with carrying heaver loads look into add-a-leaves, just be carefull not to overload them or you can break your spring-pack.

jimbo74

my post was intended originally to be jsut about air shocks but towards the end of the post are more towards regular performance shocks as well..... design plans include the soa, and redesigning of the current leaf pack with leaves from other vehicles

SoCal4Running

Best advice is to wait till your suspension is built and measure the shock length then.

WSU4runner

Check out 4x4wire.com. I think there are some good tech articles about cross-linked air shocks.

Glenn

I had Monroe air shocks on my '86 2wd. The ride sucked unless I had a lot of weight in the back. They were connected to a single line, and needed between 20 and 120 psi, depending on the load.

jimbo74

im also wondering about finding out measurements for custom shocks......

mt_goat

[QUOTE=SoCal4Running]I dont thing the words air shock and off-road performace can be used in the same sentance.
Air shocks are a waste of money, shock mounts are not meant to support vehicle weight not to mention they ride like crap
QUOTE]

I'm going to have to strongly disagree with that statement. I've been wheeling for years with them front and rear, loaded down to the max in the back and winch and winch bumper in the front, and the shock mounts are quite adequate for the job. They will give lift without losing articulation (great for offroad). Now I see you're in S. Cal so I agree you're not going to win the Baja 1000 with them, but for those of us that wheel slowly over rocks they are great.

mt_goat

I had to measure lengths of my old shocks and find a replacement from the back of the Monroe catalog at Sears where they show the specs. Then cross-reference the part # to a truck that takes that shock.

One thing to look out for is make sure the ends are the same style as your old shocks, ie both loop ends or one post and one loop end.

I found some air shocks that work on the rear of my pickup truck (4" lift). They fit perfect except for the upper bushing was too small, but that was fairly easy to replace with a larger one I had laying around from some old front shocks. The shocks are Monroe MA-733 they are sold for the 76-93 Dodge Ramcharger 4X4 and other pre 94 Dodge 4X4 models. The extended length is 26.25" and comp length is 15.5" .

I have air shocks on the front too, they are Gabriel HighJacker and are sold to fit the rear of a stock 2 Gen 4-runner if I remember right. They have a post mount on one end and a loop end on the other.

Both sets were bought at Autozone but you must tell them what truck the shocks are made for or else they are lost. It seems they can't take a whiz without year, make, and model.

As far as the cross-linking, they come already cross-linked, ie they share one air line. I recommend putting a small valve like is used for water lines to ice makers between the shocks so you can unlink them while on-road. In this pic you can see the valve I used to unlink my front shocks.
http://community.webshots.com/photo/...71947202hNLrgO
And here's the rear:
http://community.webshots.com/photo/...10088111luJhMz

Unlinking them is like connecting your sway bar and cross-linked is like disconnecting your sway bar.

kyle_22r

i think air bags are more popular, air shocks seem to be kind of fading away. i know they used to be quite popular though, even my truck has lines for them and an air valve on the bumper

SoCal4Running

Just brought back nightmares of seeing jacked up "stink bug" muscle cars with mess up shock mounts.

Go with a 4 or 5 link with air bags...that would be nice.

mt_goat

Yeah, air bags would be great, but how much are they? I guess the air shocks are just the poor mans air bags, but your riding on air either way right? Toyota 4x4 truck shock mounts are up to the task, I don't know about the old muscle cars.