triple spring rate???

charlie_brown · Feb 10, 2019

so i have been trying to get my truck to ride better and stay off the front bumps. when i get in to some big whoops, my front slams hard on the air bumps. full travel.

my current set up is 14" sway-a-way, 16" 450, 12" 300 with a #25 lb tender. i use the tender so i can get a decent ride hiegth thats not to high. i have come to the conclusion that i need more bump so i will remake to front cage with a 3.0 shock in the future.

for now i have about 8" bump travel (guessing).

thinking of going to a 500 16", 300 10", and a 150 4". coil bind out the 150.

anybody have experience with 3 springs?

charlie_brown · Feb 10, 2019

oh and i am running 225 psi in the front shocks and 250 psi in the bumps.

bri_man57 · Feb 10, 2019

Sounds like a weird issue! I was always under the impression for sways you want 2x the stoke length in spring length. I.e 14" shock needs 28" of spring which you have before the tender.

My truck is similar to yours, equal length beams, 14" sways, bumps, I don't recall if you have bypasses but I don't. I run 350 over 500 on 12" and 16" springs respectively. Mine was soft on the hardest hits until I started messing with the valving.

Are you sure you just don't need some valving adjustments?

Sent from my SM-G900T3 using Tapatalk

partybarge_pilot · Feb 10, 2019

The springs are not your issue.

What valving in the shock?

charlie_brown · Feb 10, 2019

bri_man57 said:

I have to use straps to compress the springs to get the cup on. pre load before preload. hahaha

with the current spring set up, i would not have about a 1 plus of no preload at full drop. the tender just keeps everything aligned at full drop.

partybarge_pilot: i am not sure whats is in it, my friend does it... RSP shocks. i will have to give them back. i will do this before another spring change.
i will report back

bri_man57 · Feb 10, 2019

I agree, I would take a look at the valving.

With respect to the lack of preload at ride height, when that happened to me it's because I didn't bump the truck out far enough when setting it up. Figured it looked "good", built some mounts, set ride height, drooped the truck out and the coils were loose at droop. I had to cut off my upper mounts and make another set "higher up" (more bump travel) to get it to where it wouldn't do that. Now I have very little preload go get desired ride height.

Does yours bump decently far away from the frame?

Sent from my SM-G900T3 using Tapatalk

marcytech · Feb 10, 2019

x2 on valving change not springs

84prerunner · Feb 10, 2019

are you using the secondary stops? how far off them are you at ride height? I agree on not changing springs if you have the ride height you want, but secondary stops can really help keep you off the bumps.

FasterNU · Feb 11, 2019

I'd say up the pressure in the shock to 330+ PSI and up the valving. At some point you are just going to get cavitation anyway though...

Drayke · Feb 11, 2019

^i would discourage going up to 330 psi of nitrogen. That's going to be painful for anything small. very harsh.

Also, adding a third spring won't make your front end stiffer, it'll make it softer.
Equivalent spring rate = (1/k1 + 1/k2 + 1/k3) ^ -1
where k1, k2, k3 are the rates of each spring.

Right now you're running 180 lb/in effective rate.
The 3 you posted as a consideration would be 83.3 lb/in effective rate. That obviously ignores the use of a any dual rate stops (triple rate stops?)

Change your valving.