Air suspension

[Ksnau]

So I did some measuring and made some changes and it's actually looking like I need a 2-in spacer to be where I want to be for the rear.

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[Horse n Buggy]

So unless something happens I plan to go to the car show in Scottsdale this Saturday if anyone wants to see it. It's also a good car show to check out anyways it's been going for decades . except when I guess it shut down for a year or two for COVID, I think the longest running car show in the country and definitely in the state and it's free. It's been going since the 60s I read. It's on talking stick road just west of the 101 at the McDonald's and there's always hundreds of cars. It goes from 3 to 8:00. Probably show up around like 4:00 pm

I added a pic of it aired up and down. I just emailed the manufacturer for a 1 inch spacer cuz I want the rear a little higher. They might not be at their extreme I read it's bad to fully unload them and I need to check the max psi rating but this was at like 10 and 90 psi iirc.

I unironically love how it looks slammed. Project is looking amazing dude

 

[Ksnau]

Thanks. Once I get my spacer it'll probably look more like where the front is. But yeah it's kind of cool with the slammed look. The spacers supposed to be in tomorrow morning so I'm going to try and get it all set up before the car show but we'll see. But no matter what I should hopefully be able to get a better video of everything going up and down. I'm just really bad at taking pictures and videos

 

[Ksnau]

Front

Rear

 

[RSH]

I like the lowered look. Have you driven it much while lowered?

 

[Ksnau]

No I can't drive it lowered because that's not where my alignment is set at. It would mess up my tires and my bushings and suspension and everything

 

[Ksnau]

See if I had straight axles front and rear and the suspension only went up and down through the entire arc. It really wouldn't matter where I wasn't the suspension for the most part but because we have independence suspension not just in the front but in the rear you have to be a lot more careful and basically pick where you want it 99% of the time and then keep it there and then I can like lower it when I park or maybe for some thing really quick or like thumb off road and I need a couple extra inches. I can raise it up for a little bit. Going really slow but for 99% of my drive and have to keep it at that stock height or wherever I get it set to

 

[Ksnau]

Thought I would give an update. I tried to get the suspension all dialed in. the front is sitting perfect but the rear I'm still having problems getting it to sit at the stock height for the rear. The springs just don't extend that far. I had bought some Firestone 2-in spacers online and just had to machine the center hole out but it turned out that I actually only needed a one inch spacer and I really don't want to say how much money I had to drop on getting two stupid holes machined. Never going back to that machine shop. I'll tell you that.

so I'm actually going to make the one inch spacers myself actually it's going to be 7/8 of an inch and then the bottom brackets. The universal layers sent are 3/8 of an inch thick.

I have some leftover aluminum from an old project from like 10 years ago that back then I bought for 10 bucks. It'd probably be 100 bucks now so I already took measurements and I cut the pieces now I just have to be able to drill the holes in the right spot and once I get that sandwichrd between the bottom bracket and the air suspension bag it should put me right where I want to be with the stock height being right in the middle of the travel for the air suspension.

Currently, I'm seeing about 5 and 1/4 inches of up and down movement with the airbag so I can raise and lower it about 2 and 1/2 inches which I really wanted three but this is fine.

I haven't off-roaded it yet but I'm interested to see how it's going to work going through the full travel because there's actually about 8 inches of travel on badlands stock but the springs only extend about 5 and 1/4 inches. Now I know when the tires extend down to the bottom of the arc it'll be fine because the block on top of the airbag can actually come off of the top rubber coil mount. I don't know how it's going to work to compress it all the way though, but I think it should be fine. Seeing as when I slam it down all the way with the airbags. It's basically already compressed all the way.

I don't know how that's going to work with the spacer in there. I'm going to have to check for clearance once I get that in there make sure nothing's going to hit.

But I still love it. It's super fun. I love to mod my cars and whenever you do something like this where it's being done in a different way or it's a custom job there's always some adjustment. But hopefully if anyone else wants to do this. I've given all the specs to the guy at universal Air. He'll be able to make the bottom bracket the right width for whatever you want and then the front has enough adjustability in it already. You'll just basically need to tell him what you want compared to where a bad land sits stock.

Currently for the rear I have the threads extended three and three quarter inches down out of the top damper mount and so with the airbag all the way down it sits at 15 and 1/4 inches aired all the way down as far as it'll go measuring from the center of the hub to the top of the wheel. Well where the black plastic liner starts and 20 and 1/2 inches all the way up at 113 psi.

It was basically as high as I could get it to extend and I didn't want to put any more air in it. So when I get that spacer in there it'll put me right at stock right height in the middle of the airbags travel I think. You never really know until you get it on there.

 

[Ksnau]

Just wanted to give a heads up. They are now officially selling the bronco sport air suspension kit, which is the exact same kit that I've been running on mine for a couple weeks now and I stayed in communication with the manufacturer so he knows what all had to be changed because it started as a Ford Maverick kit and they just had to change a tiny little bit for the rear airbag bracket to make it work on the broncos sport.

Also I did want to add this is just for the springs. You still need to figure out your air compressor and tank and valve block and stuff.

Also, I want to add that I did get the spacer in for mine for the rear bags because I didn't want mine slammed all the way to the ground. I wanted mine to ride at stock ride height and then be able to raise and lower it some.

Initially I bought a set of Firestone 2" spacers off Amazon that I thought would work. But then I found out I had to cut out the middle out to fit over the locator dowel in the lower control arm, and then I found out they were too tall for what I wanted.

So I had some aluminum left over from a project from like a decade ago. So with just an angle grinder and a cheap drill press and some stepped drill bits I was able to make my own spacers although it literally took 13 hours. But now I have my rear as well as the front right at stock right height and it can still go up about an inch and a half higher and go down about 3.25" in the rear and the front can go up or down about 2.5" and so I'm super happy.

And I did pass that all on to the manufacturer so y'all shouldn't have to deal with that and you only need that if you have a badlands first edition or heritage limited trim because they get the extra inch of lift.

 

[RSH]

Great work!
How does the ride compare to stock at the different ride heights?

I still really liked the slammed look.

 

[Ksnau]

The rides good. It's a little softer. It does take some time to get it dialed in to how you want it, but it has so much adjustment built into it that it's not really an issue but just the way that I've got it. It's a little softer. Other than that everything's good and I can raise and lower the front like 2 and 1/2 inches and the rear even with a 1-in spacer I can only raise it an inch and a half. But that's still plenty for me and I can still lower it like 4 inches. And that's enough for my dog to be able to get in without straining himself which was one of the major reasons I got this.

It does look pretty cool with the slammed look. basically anywhere when I park I always drop it all the way down, even the front even though I don't have to do the front for my dog. And it's just super fun to play with. Sometimes I'll be sitting at a stop light and I'll just play with it going up and down and I like to think that the people behind me are wondering what the heck is going on.

 

[RSH]

Sounds like a sucessful endeavor.
Next you'll be jumping the BS like the low riders, lol

 

[Ksnau]

No, the next thing I'm going to be doing is making subframe connectors and they're also going to function as rock sliders. But they'll be nice and tucked way up high so you won't really see them and they won't affect ground clearance hardly at all.

Them maybe some lights and a grill guard.

After that I want to talk to quaife or wave track and see if the limited slip diffs that they made for the focus RS front differential would work in ours. The housing looks to be slightly different so it's probably no. But you never know till you ask.

After that it'll be more power. I'll probably start with doing intercooler piping and a slightly larger intercooler because usually the stock intercoolers are about maxed out with the stock power levels and I noticed one huge bottleneck right before the throttle body and I'm sure if I looked at the rest of the piping I would notice more.

I'd probably try to go to a two and a half inch pipe if possible but I haven't looked at the compressor outlet and throttle body size and what the new intercooler pipe diameter would be, and I know that these pipes they don't go under the engine and transmission anymore. They go over where the engine and transmission meet. So I'm not sure how much room there is for bigger pipe but that's what I'd be looking for first.

then they make these spacers that go between the intake manifold and the head. And usually it's just to add extra fuel injectors or meth injection. But I think that they also help with airflow for the transition because if you look at the intake manifold at least on the other 2.0s there's four ports. But the head actually has 8 cuz it has individual ports for each intake valve. So it's basically one big port in the intake going into two and there's this flat surface that air hits in between those two intake ports for each cylinder and you can take those spacers and slightly modify them or knife edge them to get a better transition and slightly better airflow or at least that's the idea. I don't know if there's been any dyno tests to prove if it helps enough or not. And I probably wouldn't need to add extra injectors because if I remember right and it's the same as the focus STs. The stock direct injection injectors are usually good to about 400 wheel horsepower and I would not be going over that. I probably want to stay at about 300 to 350 wheel horsepower and just help get more power at the top end so it doesn't fall on its face after 5000 RPMs but still have that good downlow instant torque.

 

[Ksnau]

View attachment 42892
Got it slammed down at work. It doesn't quite tuck the tires all the way anymore but it gives me a nice lift now when I want it.

 

[Ksnau]

So I just want to give an update. Everything is still going good on the air suspension. However, the cheap Chinese air solenoid that I have controlling it right now, which is basically a clone of the Accu-air VR4 I think it's called. Well I've noticed that it's not machined well and so there's leaks on some of the passages. So like when I air up all four tires some tires get more air than the others. Also, I found that if I leave my car for a couple of days without driving the front right tire is leaking a very tiny amount but you don't notice it unless it's left there for a really long time.

So I would say if anyone else does this it's worth it to pay extra for a good name brand control system. I would also get a good name brand aluminum tank since they're not much more. I wouldn't take the chance on the cheap Amazon clones cuz I've had a problem with debris in them holding the valves up when I first got it. And now I've noticed that the passages aren't quite right. Causing issues with air springs getting different amounts of air and the very slow leak on the front right. And I verified that it's not the lines or the air springs.

But the thing is that the Amazon clone is only 150 bucks. Where is the Accu-air one is like 550 bucks. So if you're willing to deal with that, it can be a nice cost saving measure and if you can get all your stuff right away and install it right away. They do have a 30 day return policy. Just the problem was with mine I wasn't able to find out until months later. And I did test it and it worked electronically but it was too late by the time I got my air springs and had it all put together to realize the the other issue.

Also I have a 3 gallon tank and basically if you're not playing with it a lot I would say that you could go down to even a 2 gallon tank and that would be enough air but you would probably wouldn't want anything smaller.

I also put two videos on my YouTube page when I went out yesterday mud bogging up in Flagstaff to see how it worked and it drives just like a normal bronco sport off-road in the mud.

I have noticed though if you're off-road on a very bumpy road like going over boulders and rocks and stuff when you air it up all the way to get extra clearance it does ride a lot bumpier. And that's just because you have to put like 100 PSI in the air springs to raise it up that high and so it doesn't have as much give. It's a lot stiffer and that's just how it is. It's the same thing on the Jeep Grand Cherokee and the Rams that have OEM air suspension. But I still think that it works just fine for me.

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