Which way to go??

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shane76

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Gday guys,

I have just over 1year old rx d23, I'm a sparky and last time I reloaded the ute I have about 300kg of gear and tools. I'm a bit confused as to which way to go to fix the sagging back end that is a very harsh ride. I don't want to lift the vehicle as maybe 6 weeks out of the year it is our holiday car. Do I go for upgraded springs hopefully at about standard height. Or do I go airbags or a BOTH. Every suspension mob has a different opinion and I'm a tad perplexed.

Cheers fellas
 
Shane the D23 is now showing a few issues when loaded and sagging in the arse. You have coils not springs and 300kg should be ok but you can improve that I only speak to Zordo's for that sort of thing now. No bullshit advice without the overheads. At a guess you just need a higher rate coil without the lift.
 
If you have coils, airbags aren't an issue - use them happily. The problem with airbags is that on a leaf spring setup, they introduce a new pivot point in an area of the chassis that wasn't designed to take that sort of load. In a coil setup, the top of the coil IS designed to take the load so putting airbags in changes nothing in terms of stress and forces, just in ride comfort. For coil springs, airbags are an excellent solution.

For leaf springs setups, dual rate springs are the best solution. Still uses the original mount points that were designed to take the load, but don't fully engage when lightly loaded (so not harsh on bumps when empty) and engage fully when loaded up - I have ARB Dakar dual rate springs on mine and can't speak highly enough about how brilliant they are to drive with.

With all that said, you should still take care regardless of your suspension setup especially if you're towing. We tow a 2.5T caravan and when approaching dips, causeways, floodways and the like, we always slow down. The problem is simple: the faster you go through one of these, the more forces involved in it. The vertical downforce on the towball as a caravan pitches forward while the ute rear pitches upwards at the exit point of a causeway increases the towball downforce by several magnitudes (and speed increases this further). Because the towball is a considerable distance from the axle (compare this distance on a Patrol or Pathfinder) the lever action is greater, so that same force is multiplied again and the chassis CAN bend. With an inappropriate setup (like airbags on a leaf spring setup) it often WILL bend.
 
old.tony mentioned it a bit.
one thing to watch with double cabs is how you load the tray.
all makes end up with problems because people put load in the wrong place. the load should be placed around the rear axle, preferably forward of the rear axle. which on a double cab means in the rear seat.
basically the max load gets derated depending on how far back you put the load. nissan actually publish the derating for putting a trailer on. even tho trailer is only 100kg or so the leverage effect makes it act like a much larger load.
this is why there is so many double cabs with broken chassis, they put to much weight at the rear.

one problem with ar bags is over loading the ute and pumping up the bags to compensate. basically hiding the fact its overloaded. its the overloading that stresses the chassis.
 
Thanks for the advice guys, I have a million thoughts running around in my head. I try not to overload it as it is my personal car that I use for work. And being that it is new, I don't want to kill it. I can get the 60psi Airbag man bags and just pump them up to level the load and away we go, they are about $350 from memory. Toughdog quoted me 0-300kg springs that will lift the unloaded height by about 35mm, they were about $180 per spring.
 
one of the problems i have with the d22 is with the load springs in the back which gave it a 2' lift, it points the lights hard into the ground, which makes night driving on dip difficult when empty.
air bags is the best way provided the standard springs are not known to sag (which is the problem with d22's) and you do not over load.
 
Old man emu sorted out my D40 sparky bus.
Put in heaviest springs and leafs available.
Lifted it about an inch only back to where it should sit, and flattened out the ride.
Has all been on there 80,000 ks now and still feels brand new.
Made in Australia too ;)
 
Old man emu sorted out my D40 sparky bus.
Put in heaviest springs and leafs available.
Lifted it about an inch only back to where it should sit, and flattened out the ride.
Has all been on there 80,000 ks now and still feels brand new.
Made in Australia too ;)


Mate what's it ride like when you take everything out??
 
Ride is great when the thing is unloaded.

being a d40 it was pretty softly sprung from new, when i first loaded it up for work it was hitting the bump stops straight away.
The firmer springs and shocks seemed to make the ride better all round, loaded up or not.

Old man emu give a range of options for each vehicle.
For my d40 the choice was optimal performance from 0-400kg constant load.
OR
optimal performance for 400kg + constant load.
shock absorbers in the kit are then matched to whichever weight spring you choose.

I went with the heavier setup because the amount of shite i carry is over half a tonne.
Even with this heavy setup the unloaded ride really is damn good.

does your rig have coil springs in the rear or leafs?
 
Coil in the back mate, When I had my D40 I went to Ultimate suspension and they did a 2inch lift with all new shocks and springs and leaves. But unloaded it was a harsh bumpy ride. Don't want the same thing for the new beast
 
Shane, you might be better off fitting a set of rear air bags, atleast this way you can pump them up when you have all the weight in the tub and if you take the weight out you can let the pressure out to an even height. its not worth the risk buying a good set of heavy duty type springs only to find a bumpy or harsh ride when the weights out.
 
Cheers Jonney, that's kinda the way I was leaning. But was just unsure the bags were up to being inflated all day everyday except a few weeks a year
 
yes i,m not sure how long an airbag would stay inflated, the old Citreon car was great for air bag susspension you start up the engine and the airbags would inflate and when you parked the car the airbags would drop down.
you really need to speak to a specialist who knows exactly which way you would go with this type of susspension set up.
 
Have spoken to a few....but with such wide and varied responses, it only confused me further
 
All i can recommend really is give ome a crack.
Dont know anyone whos been disappointed with the results
from old man emu.
As i said the unladen ride is more comfortable than it was with stock suspension as its firm but not harsh
 
That's true ericcs, cheers guys for your advice and opinions as always. Will let you know how I go.
 

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