Airbags?

[D1X99]

Installed my Airlift 1000’s. Pretty happy with the turn out. Running 5 lbs with no load, no difference from factory feel. Loaded up the little rv (2850 dry lbs), full load of water, probably 400 lbs in the box and bumped them up to 15 lbs - sits great!! I use a Dewalt cordless compressor - thread it on and it tells you current pressure - use the dial to set the pressure and that’s it. Great little compressor.

 

[Syberspace]

Installed the these last week. Just did 800 miles towing two Polaris RZR's on a 22' HD aluminum trailer. Guessing around 6500 lb total plus gear in the bed. So maybe 700-800 tongue weight. Set the bags a 35psi and had about 1/2-1" squat. Towed great!

 

[dthiss]

I just installed the kit I bought months ago. Was a universal kit, but Airlift sent me a set of the Raptor specific bottom spacers. Super easy, took about an hour. Installed the fill valve in one of the license plate holes. Need to hook up the camper with the WDH and see where it ends up. Possibly do that this weekend.

 

[Sage]

I have a gen 1. I take one 2000 mile trip every June, towing a 14' trailer. I put bags on. My install was no air lines, valve right on the bag. Yes they work but I remove them as soon as I get home.

Top frame mount stays on. Bottom, over the axle takes 10 min to put on. Bag has 3 bolts, another 5 minutes.

Side note : they are not well designed. Bolts are too long and hit. Bottom mount too wide, scraped the HlL out of my shocks.

I'm going to put on different springs. My constant load is over 500 lbs of tools \ recovery stuff (which I've never used)!

 

[BayRaptor925]

Just installed the airlift 1000 kit on my Raptor R. I haven't towed with it yet but plan to this weekend. I will say even aired down to 4psi I can still feel the stiffness in the rear. I aired them down to 0 and it feels much more like stock. I know they don't recommend it but I am willing to sacrifice a bag for the sake of the factory ride. Feeling the bags at 0psi I don't think anything will happen unless I plan to do some off-roading. In that case I'll be pulling them off.

 

[sjenn1122]

I haven't read every post in this thread so I don't know if someone's said this already, but DON'T DO IT! I installed the gen 2 airlift 5000 kit (for Raptors) and it's terrible! Absolutely ruined the ride. You feel every bump and kit kills the suspension travel. I had the 5000 kit on my old 150 platinum and I loved it. But it just doesn't work on the raptor. Again, DON'T DO IT!

 

[dfw62]

If you want to tow with your Gen 3 Raptor and don't want excessive rear end squat the Air Lift 1000 bags are the way to go. I'm towing a 5100# 22.5' travel trailer with just over 600# tongue weight. Prior to the air bags with an Andersen WD hitch there was too much rear end squat for my liking. I run 27 pounds in the bags and 6 threads exposed on the Andersen and she sits perfect and handles great when towing. Unloaded with 5 psi in the bags I do not notice any meaningful loss in ride quality. My truck does not see any heavy off road use so not concerned with that aspect but expect the bags would not handle aggressive off road use well.

For those towing I expect you're well aware that the relatively low payload rating of our trucks (1214# for mine) is typically the limiting factor when towing. This is one of the reasons I went with the Andersen WD hitch as hitch weight counts against payload and the Anderson was the lightest I could find that had many favorable reviews. Very happy with it.

 

[CACRaptor]

I haven't read every post in this thread so I don't know if someone's said this already, but DON'T DO IT! I installed the gen 2 airlift 5000 kit (for Raptors) and it's terrible! Absolutely ruined the ride. You feel every bump and kit kills the suspension travel. I had the 5000 kit on my old 150 platinum and I loved it. But it just doesn't work on the raptor. Again, DON'T DO IT!

The Gen 2 kit is completely different than the Gen 3 due to the leaf springs vs the coil springs. The Gen 3 should ride and work much better.

 

[sjenn1122]

The Gen 2 kit is completely different than the Gen 3 due to the leaf springs vs the coil springs. The Gen 3 should ride and work much better.

Oh, sorry! CACRaptor is correct! I didn't realize this was the Gen3 thread. The coil helpers should be fine in the 3rd gen!

I forgot to say a couple things to those that are interested in this: 1) If you're going to hook up an onboard compressor, make a connection point in your air lines to connect an air hose to air up tires and such. It's easy to do and the air bags are pretty much little compressor tanks. 2) You don't need to buy a compressor kit unless you want to. I used to have the Wireless AirOne kit, and I loved it, but it's expensive.

I set up my own compressor and relief solenoid system for less than half the cost of AirLift compressor kits. I connected the compressor (a used AirLift 16060) to a relay that was triggered by upfitter switch 5 and connected a relief solenoid to switch 6. Note: The compressor uses 12 amps so you'll have to use a relay if you're going to use one of the higher switches with lower ratings. You could put the compressor on one of the higher amperage switches, but I already had lights on 1-3, so I just used a relay connected to the battery.

I got the solenoid from amazon for $10 and 3D printed a box/mount for it. Happy to share the print file if anyone is interested.

Please excuse my hideous wiring. It was 105° outside and I was tired. I'll pretty it up later.

 

[j1nino]

Just got back from towing my 8 1/2' x 20' trailer with a 3000lb car inside (400 mile round trip). Total weight is around 6500lbs.
I'm using a Equalizer WD hitch with this setup and the airbags when I took this picture were at 20psi.
Took some measurements and had 1/2" of squat in the rear with 30psi in the airbags.
Towed amazingly, not sway or seesawing, plenty of power to get going.
Averaged 9.8mpg