Airrex Installed. Riding stiff like a Jackhammer

[dubcivic]

Does this look like its installed correctly? I'm running 50 psi in the front and 75psi in the rear, with all dampers adjusted to soft and its still driving like a trampoline. I literally fly out of my seat even going over the smallest of bumps. The struts are already have a decent amount of travel, should i try to raise em up more so i can drive with a lower psi? Any help/feedback thanks!

[Aitch]

When I had AirRex installed, I wasn't that pleased with the ride quality either. Mostly in the rear. I partially put it down to my kit using sleeve-style bags in the rear, I thought that having the double-bellows back there would help by having a lower air pressure at ride height.

However, I think that in some cases the damping is also not the greatest in terms of how compliant they can be set up. When mine were set to full soft, the car just constantly bounced up and down over even minor imperfections in the road. I realized that the softest setting is actually too underdamped for the effective spring rates at ride height, so this may be one problem for you. It's a bit counterintuitive, but if you increase the damping you might actually feel the ride quality improve.

The second thing is a saying I heard recently - if you can feel it in your seat, it's from the rear suspension. This is why with mine I always suspected the rear suspension was the most out of whack. Going over expansion joints or ripples in the road, the car would just bounce up high off of them, bouncing me around in the seat, and then crash down hard (this was at medium stiffness). But if I increased the damping further, things became rock hard. So the damping rates weren't set right IMO.

[dubcivic]

Thanks. Yes this is exactly what im experiencing and im pretty sure its from the rear also. Over every bump i hear a thud noise from the rear not sure exactly what that is. Would lengthening the travel on the struts help at all? Btw one of my rear dampers is already broken. Not sure why they make them out of plastic.

[Aitch]

Yeah if it seems like you can get more travel out of the struts that would help. The way mine were initially set up it seemed like even at 0psi the shocks might have been keeping the suspension from compressing further so there might have been more travel to be had.

[Alex@BagRiders]

What type of suspension did you have on the car initially OP? AirREX struts are designed to ride low and because of their high damping, they will ride more like a coilover. Some love this, others don't but at the end of the day they are going to be stiff for your platform.

As for changing the heights of your suspension, you will actually want to spin the lower mount down to extend the overall length of the strut. Don't mess with the bag itself since it is sealed to the strut and raising or lowering it won't do anything for you. Make sure not to extend the height of the strut so far that it clunks as you are driving around. If you do that, you will blow out the dampers because you are literally maxing out the range of the damper itself.

[Daxter]

I have the same prob, how to correct that? thx a lot