Do you want to update your vehicle's ride, braking, and steering abilities with TCI's Air Ride IFS, but there are a few questions holding you back? Basically, you need to know what the benefits are about this fairly new thing called "Air Ride." Well, it has been a common way of suspending commercial vehicles such as buses and trucks, but has only been recently used in automotive applications.
It's popular with street rodders and customizers because enthusiasts like the idea that they can control their rods' ride height and maintain a constant spring rate at the same time. It's been available long enough that people are becoming more comfortable with the idea of replacing a metal-wound coil spring with that of a rubber bellows type cylinder (air spring).
An air spring has absolutely nothing in common with an air shock, other than they both use air as a way to fill the open area of mass in the rubber cylinders. An air shock works in conjunction with a spring and can't hold up a vehicle on its own. It needs a form of spring-style suspension to hold up the mass. An air spring replaces any other form of spring. With TCI's Air Ride suspension, you have the capability of raising and lowering your vehicle in a matter of seconds. A switch controls an on-board air compressor and holding tank which empty the spring and blow it back up on demand.
Total Cost Involved Engineering (TCI) offers complete systems with everything an enthusiast needs to complete the project. Give the company a call to find out if it has a kit that meets your needs. It also offers a retro-fit kit for those of you who heard about this style of suspension too late and have already installed one of the company's traditional IFS kits.
Let's see how the guys at Precision Street Rods & Machines installed TCI's Air Ride suspension kit in a '48 Ford woodie. In the last installment, we showed you how to install TCI's rear kit in this same car.
