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Air bags.(the kind on trucks)

F

flying belgian

Well-known Member
On my Freightliner truck when I crawled under today to grease drive shaft I noticed the air bags for suspension are really cracking on the bottom of each bag. Kinda where they curve in at bottom mount. Do you guys change them when they start cracking or do you wait until one actually starts to leak? This is the first truck I have with air bag suspension.
 
If they are cracked bad I would change them before they blow. One heck of a rough ride if they blow on the road because you are than ridding on bottom (no suspension).
 
If they are cracked that bad they are not long for the world anyway. It is fairly rare to blow one tho except for dump trucks and such where the load can be dropped in. They usually just start to leak. I've never had one blow on one of my trucks, but I've had a few develop leaks.
 
If you are loaded and they blow they sound like a bomb has gone off and can make gravel fly. I had 1 blow while dumping corn and you don't want to stand beside them .
 
Small stress cracks let them be for a while unless you have money to burn. To see if there really leaking spray the bag with soapy water if it looks like it has rabies change it. They will crack due to the movement of the suspension even new ones.
 
Been trucking for 45 years most of those years with air ride trucks. If even age cracking is severe that is an automatic OOS for the DOT. Air bags are not that expensive and do not take long to change. When mine get about so far along, they get changed.
 
I blew one a few years ago on a 379 pete. Was dumping corn at the local elevator and when she blew it sounded like a tire blowing out. I had just been under there a few days prior to that and replaced a brake canister, didnt see any cracking. The truck was only two years old at the time. I think one of the old fellers that was helping us that day drove it 20 plus miles with the air dropped, as he did this numerous times before. One time we really had a laugh as he had dumped a load of corn at the ethanol plant, was trying to leave the dump but just sat there spinning and not moving. He was driving a single screw Pete with a lift tag and forgot to lift it prior to leaving the dump. So it just sat there spinning for the longest time . . .he had the most dumb look on his face! Someone finally helped him out.
 
The company I worked for at one time had 4 tractors with air tags and if you didn't watch yourself you could get hung up real easy but they did have an advantage that in winter you could raise up the tag and the weight of tag helped on ice and snow. We had a Freighfliner straight truck with air ride ride suspension and if your forgot to air it up it rode like a lumber wagon.
 
Mine were not too badly cracked but started to leak at 7 years on my last International. Not surprisingly after the first one they all went soon after, so my recomendation would be to do all of them at once.
 
If you drive with the air ride dumped with a 10 spd fuller/eaton trans, you will blow the auxilary synchronizer in the trans. The driveline angles change with incorrect air bag ride height, and this causes vibration , which blows the synchro and you will have no lo side or go to false neutral. It happens on the hiway in hi side, so when you come to a stop it won't move or you only have hi side. Mark
 
I've had my truck 12 years. It had a bunch of new parts on it when I bought it. I think I replaced two air bags that looked ugly. $90 a piece. As I recall one of the other ones looked new, and one didn't. 40000# IH air ride. I should probably be looking it over!
 
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