Rocket Man's 2008 Bagged CC Silverado Build AKA "THE MACHINE"

[07Burb]

dang, man

 

[Rocket Man]

Thank you Amazon Prime. After reading the Airlift manual again and realizing this system doesn’t use an external pressure switch to turn on the compressors and the manifold/ ecu does that job, I saw in the fine print that only one compressor is controlled unless you buy an additional compressor wiring harness. It will be here Wednesday for $4 more than the cheapest eBay price, $110 to my door.

 

[iamdub]

And just as I figured, soon as the bed was out of the way the ****** work and problems raised their ugly heads. I’m surprised the rear bags got any air at all, the lines are crushed almost flat. There’s 2 pinch points on each line that will have to be addressed. And the plumbing at the valves just looks bad. I’m super glad I will be going to a nice manifold with 8 valves instead of 4, all electronically controlled and monitored. There won’t be any more lean in the corners or when there’s more weight on one side since the air won’t shift from side to side. It just seems weird they went to so much trouble to build this beautiful frame and then put in such a cheap air management system, the most basic kind. Their wiring harnesses look terrible too. I will be on a mission to clean this all up. I have new aluminum hard lines ordered, they’ll be here Thursday. And I bought a real nice bender awhile back so I will be practicing. I can’t do any worse than what they did. I will strive to make it look nice and be functional and safe too.

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Good thing you caught it now rather than after it split and dumped that corner to the pavement at 80MPH.

 

[Rocket Man]

Good thing you caught it now rather than after it split and dumped that corner to the pavement at 80MPH.

The entire rear would have dumped since there’s only one set of valves for the rear. Kind of like when I blew a front bag and the whole front went down. Luckily with a full tank of air I got it onto the shoulder of the freeway. But that’s not good with a bodied truck since it lays on the ground- it’s hard to get it up so you can tow it, and even then it’s tricky since the suspension disappears into the body with no air in it so tow truck drivers are left scratching their heads. It took us 4 hours to move it a few miles. AAA Plus paid him for his time. Now I’ll at least have control of each corner so limping it will be easier if something happens.

 

[iamdub]

The entire rear would have dumped since there’s only one set of valves for the rear. Kind of like when I blew a front bag and the whole front went down. Luckily with a full tank of air I got it onto the shoulder of the freeway. But that’s not good with a bodied truck since it lays on the ground- it’s hard to get it up so you can tow it, and even then it’s tricky since the suspension disappears into the body with no air in it so tow truck drivers are left scratching their heads. It took us 4 hours to move it a few miles. AAA Plus paid him for his time. Now I’ll at least have control of each corner so limping it will be easier if something happens.

I remember now- you just had F/B/P switches. Yeah, it's kinda crazy to see such cut corners on an otherwise high-caliber build.

 

[Rocket Man]

I tore the shit out of it today. The old system is no more, the only thing left of the original install is the bags and tank. Actually just the rear bags since I replaced both fronts as well as both compressors. The truck looks like it’s flying , it’s up so high on the stands. Another great quality job was apparent where they tapped into the power for the switches at the column. Just a bare wire wrapped around with no solder, just electrical tape holding it.

 

[Rocket Man]

I got the new manifold mounted. That’s about it for today, got a dr appointment in a bit. Oh, I removed the DIC portion of the old dash panel that had the air gauge and installed it in the newer panel. No more out of place air gauge in the middle of the dash!

 

[Doubeleive]

And just as I figured, soon as the bed was out of the way the ****** work and problems raised their ugly heads. I’m surprised the rear bags got any air at all, the lines are crushed almost flat. There’s 2 pinch points on each line that will have to be addressed. And the plumbing at the valves just looks bad. I’m super glad I will be going to a nice manifold with 8 valves instead of 4, all electronically controlled and monitored. There won’t be any more lean in the corners or when there’s more weight on one side since the air won’t shift from side to side. It just seems weird they went to so much trouble to build this beautiful frame and then put in such a cheap air management system, the most basic kind. Their wiring harnesses look terrible too. I will be on a mission to clean this all up. I have new aluminum hard lines ordered, they’ll be here Thursday. And I bought a real nice bender awhile back so I will be practicing. I can’t do any worse than what they did. I will strive to make it look nice and be functional and safe too.

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Looks like that needs a notch to run the line

 

[yates ™]

The entire rear would have dumped since there’s only one set of valves for the rear. Kind of like when I blew a front bag and the whole front went down. Luckily with a full tank of air I got it onto the shoulder of the freeway. But that’s not good with a bodied truck since it lays on the ground- it’s hard to get it up so you can tow it, and even then it’s tricky since the suspension disappears into the body with no air in it so tow truck drivers are left scratching their heads. It took us 4 hours to move it a few miles. AAA Plus paid him for his time. Now I’ll at least have control of each corner so limping it will be easier if something happens.

You need to make a little emergency kit. I have one that includes 4 Schrader valves, some couplers, and a few feet of extra air line. With this you should be able to get the truck up on each corner if the worst happens. It wouldn't completely help when losing a bag but would maybe help enough get the truck jacked up.

 

[Rocket Man]

Looks like that needs a notch to run the line

Im planning on drilling through holes and using grommets so the line comes straight out of the elbows.