My car is lowered, but not ridiculous on H&R springs. Wheels are not stock, wider offset, but also not ridiculous at 35mm (18x8.5). With a 245/40 tire they rubbed over moderate bumps, and badly with passengers. Rolled the fenders....a lot. Helped, but still rubbed. H&R are just a pretty soft spring, and even with the Bilstein shocks the rubbing was happening, and once I started making more power the car dolphined noticeably as well.
The Air Lift kit was mentioned in another thread, so I took a look. Immediately wanted to give it a try. Took a couple of tries with Amazon because they were backordered, but they finally showed up. Here`s how it went:
First off, kit # 80754 is the ideal one for our cars. It fits very well inside the rear coil springs, dimensionally speaking. (getting them in was another story. I`ll get to that). It comes with two bags, plenty of hose, zip ties, clamps, a T fitting (didn`t use it. I`ll also cover that), and two air valves.
**edit: kind of a "no sh*t" point, but jack the car up and let the wheels hang to let the coil springs expand for install. Ramps aren`t going to cut it**
The bags are not "hard" to install. Take the rubber nipple cover off, squeeze the air out, put the cover back on so it stays deflated. Then shove. For the love of God, shove. My first one went in fairly easily, the second took a good 20 minutes of wiggling, cussing, and more shoving. Once they`re in, pull the nipple covers off and let them expand, then push them to the bottom of the spring. You do this in order to get the plastic bolt protective cover onto the bolt at the top side, inside the spring. It keeps the bolt from chafing the bag. There are two disks/bag seats included with the kit, designed to go inside the spring for the bag to rest on. They don`t fit, I didn`t want to grind them down, so I decided to forego using them. No issues so far.
Once the bags are installed, the rest is easy. Route the hose where you want it, avoiding the exhaust. I routed mine down the control arm, up and over the muffler heat shield, then just drilled out the lower license plate holes and installed the air valves there. I figured it would be better to have independent air pressure control so I didn`t use the T.
They don`t use a lot of pressure. 5psi min, 50psi max. I stopped most tire rubbing with a full tank of gas at about 18psi, with 30 in there I took a whole group of friends on a ride and no rubbing. Squat under acceleration is completely gone. At 40psi it was ultra firm, but no pogo-ing (possibly due to the Bilsteins). A little much for DD, but man did it corner like a champ. Almost considered changing my RSB setting. I let some air out instead. Been driving around at about 25psi and it seems perfect for me. I use/keep a mountain bike compact tire pump in the jack storage spot to air them up with. They`re small volume and a compressor would be overkill. Having the valves at the license plate makes for no hassle access.
Total install time was about 45 minutes. There are other kits that will work, but the 80754 is the best fitting one, given that AirLift doesn`t make a vehicle specific kit for us. For less than $100 I will call this a total win.
The Air Lift kit was mentioned in another thread, so I took a look. Immediately wanted to give it a try. Took a couple of tries with Amazon because they were backordered, but they finally showed up. Here`s how it went:
First off, kit # 80754 is the ideal one for our cars. It fits very well inside the rear coil springs, dimensionally speaking. (getting them in was another story. I`ll get to that). It comes with two bags, plenty of hose, zip ties, clamps, a T fitting (didn`t use it. I`ll also cover that), and two air valves.
**edit: kind of a "no sh*t" point, but jack the car up and let the wheels hang to let the coil springs expand for install. Ramps aren`t going to cut it**
The bags are not "hard" to install. Take the rubber nipple cover off, squeeze the air out, put the cover back on so it stays deflated. Then shove. For the love of God, shove. My first one went in fairly easily, the second took a good 20 minutes of wiggling, cussing, and more shoving. Once they`re in, pull the nipple covers off and let them expand, then push them to the bottom of the spring. You do this in order to get the plastic bolt protective cover onto the bolt at the top side, inside the spring. It keeps the bolt from chafing the bag. There are two disks/bag seats included with the kit, designed to go inside the spring for the bag to rest on. They don`t fit, I didn`t want to grind them down, so I decided to forego using them. No issues so far.
Once the bags are installed, the rest is easy. Route the hose where you want it, avoiding the exhaust. I routed mine down the control arm, up and over the muffler heat shield, then just drilled out the lower license plate holes and installed the air valves there. I figured it would be better to have independent air pressure control so I didn`t use the T.
They don`t use a lot of pressure. 5psi min, 50psi max. I stopped most tire rubbing with a full tank of gas at about 18psi, with 30 in there I took a whole group of friends on a ride and no rubbing. Squat under acceleration is completely gone. At 40psi it was ultra firm, but no pogo-ing (possibly due to the Bilsteins). A little much for DD, but man did it corner like a champ. Almost considered changing my RSB setting. I let some air out instead. Been driving around at about 25psi and it seems perfect for me. I use/keep a mountain bike compact tire pump in the jack storage spot to air them up with. They`re small volume and a compressor would be overkill. Having the valves at the license plate makes for no hassle access.
Total install time was about 45 minutes. There are other kits that will work, but the 80754 is the best fitting one, given that AirLift doesn`t make a vehicle specific kit for us. For less than $100 I will call this a total win.
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