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Re: air shock success on 79 spitfire

To: "Donald H. Locker" <dhl@mrdog.msl.com>
Subject: Re: air shock success on 79 spitfire
From: "Bradley D. Richardson" <brichard@us.oracle.com>
Date: Mon, 02 Aug 1999 13:04:14 -0700
Donald,

I agree with you, and your analogy.  There is only one problem.  The car
sat at a slant before the new shocks, it now sits virtually perfectly
level.  The only thing I changed was the shocks.

I figured it was either a shock that had too much 'pressure in it, or
perhaps a shock that had a leak.  Either way, the new shocks fixed my
problem.

Brad

Donald H. Locker wrote:
> 
> Hi, Bradley.
> 
> I'm glad you identified the problems that all of us who were
> never contemplating the air shock upgrade never had to avoid. :)
> 
> > It was a pain to do this.  Ran into many problems.  Even had to remove
> > the anti sway bar, the starter, the battery, and one of my front
> > speakers.
> 
> On a more serious note, unless the shock that was "bad" was bad in
> such a way that it was sticking, it should not have affected at all
> the ride height.  "shock absorbers" are actually dampers, and (again,
> unless it is sticky, so it has an ability to apply a force without
> motion) a damper can not affect ride height.
> 
> Try putting your hand in a tub of water -- as long as you don't try to
> move your hand, there is no force applied to it.  Now if you touch
> against the bottom of the tub (like a sticky seal might behave), you
> won't be able to move your hand until you reach some threshold force.
> But most "shocks" fail by losing their fluid, not by getting sticky,
> in my experience.
> 
> > And, I found out why my spitfire was sitting so slanted.  Must have had
> > a bad rear shock, even though they weren't that old.  When I was done,
> > had about 50 pounds of pressure in each shock, put the car down, ran it
> > a little to reseat the tires and wheels correctly, and lo and behold, my
> > car no longer sits with a 2 inch slant on both the front and the back.
> 
> Donald.

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