Anyone bagging the front of a Dakota might want to read this...

[ianrulz123]

Well I finally got around to getting the front of my truck done. I have the CoolRide kit for 97-03 Dakotas. The install went fairly smoothly, with a few minor set-backs:

First of all, the upper bag mounts don' t have a hole in the for the Air Line to run from the bag to the valve. After much thought we decided to make our own hole in the upper bracket rather then cut more of the frame, I felt this was a MAJOR OVERSIGHT on AirRide Technologies part, let me tell ya its no easy task drilling through those brackets!

Mounting the shocks was also a challenge, but once we got rollin it was not as bad as we though.

I have ton' s of pics I will post of the whole thing once I download them from the camera.

I have a v6 extended cab truck and it seems like it takes ALOT to raise it, with 90 psi in the tank I can only lift the front end to about 2inches lower then stock, with 125psi in the tank I can raise it about 2 inches higher then stock. I don' t have gauges in the system so I don' t know how much pressure is in the bags.

[ianrulz123]

http://www.oakland.edu/~irashton/FrontLow
This is the front, it will go ALOT lower then that, but the wheels hit the inner fenders, this is probably the height I am going to drive at, maybe a little higher.

http://www.oakland.edu/~irashton/ShockMount
The dredded shock mounting. We actually drilled the control arm, threaded the studs into the arm, and then welded them into the the control arm.

http://www.oakland.edu/~irashton/BracketHole
This is the hole we had to put in the upper mount to run the air line through. I took this pic before I slid the grommet in and put some goop in to secure it. By putting the hole on that side of the mount I was able to run the line through the frame past the exhaust.

http://www.oakland.edu/~irashton/FrontFinished
This is the front end assembled with the shock in place. The inside of the tire rubs the stub a little bit when turning lock-to-lock, but I think when I change to a bigger rim with smaller tire it will get better, its really not bad at all.

[ianrulz123]

I don' t know why the pictures won' t work, they do when I click " preview"

I guess if you want to see the pic' s you' ll have to cut&paste the links unless someone knows how to make them work?


ianrulz321@hotmail.com

[darren@ridetech.com]

I' m glad you got it all figured out, but the reason you had trouble with the airline is because we usually drill a hole in the frame. But then again we usuall stray away from the garden hose too.

[clynt11]

darren, how did you view the pics?

[darren@ridetech.com]

cut & paste
the images view is not available