All Air Suspension - Riding on Air

Back to Testimonial Index

Even experienced drivers can get caught out over the holiday season by changes in the performance of their vehicle's suspension that occur when they hook up a caravan, boat or trailer or load up their campers for extended trips.

"A perfectly familiar vehicle can change into an safety risk if it is overloaded, unevenly loaded or subjected to widely varying loads," says supplementary air suspension specialist James Maslin.

The heavier loads on brakes, suspensions and vehicle frames generate hazards that can remain hidden until a heavily loaded vehicle runs afoul of poor roads, bad weather, inadequate brakes or overloaded springs. The issue applies to a wide range of vehicles, extending from family cars to tradesmen's utes, 4wds, vans, campers and grey nomads' huge diversity of vehicles.

"It is a growing safety concern, with about 330,000 recreational vehicles now registered in Australia - and around 75,000 caravanners on extended tour at any one time, often in the Outback" says Mr Maslin, who is National Sales Manager of All Air Suspension. All Air suspension provides a solution to the problem of needing one suspension setting for ordinary driving and another when towing. The company's distribution network - working nationally with Airbag Man - offers Firestone Coil-Rite supplementary air suspensions with durable polyurethane airbags that fit inside existing coil springs to provide levelling control to a vehicle when under load, providing comfort and stability.

The system (and the complementary Ride-Rite system for leaf-spring vehicles) enables owners of towing vehicles and work and recreational vehicles to adjust for varying loads and road conditions by simply inflating or deflating the airbag, just like inflating a tyre.

The Coil-Rite system provides extra support for front and rear coil springs in cars, vans, 4WD's, SUV's and motorhomes. Coil-Rite supplementary air springs are used for front-to-rear and side-to-side levelling control of a vehicle. This enables a vehicle to "level up" when towing caravans, boats and trailers or when a vehicle is carrying heavy, uneven loads. Coil-Rites are engineered to withstand the rigours dished out to coil sprung suspensions over widely varying road surfaces. Each set will support 250-500kg (subject to the vehicles gross vehicle weight rating), providing comfort and stability to a vehicle.

Reasons for fitting Coil-Rite systems include:

• Maintaining a level vehicle - with adjustability for different conditions
• Maximising safe load carrying capacity
• Increasing vehicle stability and braking performance
• Improving steering, balance and ride quality
• Greatly reducing "bottoming out" and reducing coil suspension fatigue
• Keeping headlights aimed on the road - not up in the face of oncoming traffic
• Reducing tyre wear

"Many comfortable work and recreational vehicles are set up with fairly soft suspensions which are pushed down towing a caravan, camper trailer or boat. Owners of such vehicles really need adjustable suspensions that enable their vehicles to sit flat and stable when loaded, to ensure good cornering and braking and top levels of safety."

By simply adding or removing air, operators of vehicles equipped with the kits can maintain the same vehicle ride height under different load conditions. This gives ideal performance and safety from empty to full. Air can also be added to overcome the imbalance inherent with uneven loads .

For heavier duty applications involving leaf springs, All Air dealers can fit Firestone's Ride-Rite system, which use the same type of airbag used in heavy trucks. Alternatively, Airbag Man On-Air® kits totally replace the vehicles coil springs with heavy duty air springs, providing a fully adjustable air suspension.

Correctly set up suspensions are increasingly important over the holiday season, says Mr Maslin. "Not only do you have more people spreading out to the 2700 caravan parks around the country, but also many others are going on adventure odysseys to remote locations off-road or on secondary roads.

"And often they are doing it with increasingly heavier and more luxurious RV vehicles, with self-contained toilets and showers, or with bigger boats or 'vans in tow. It is much more luxurious than the old swag and tent - but there are traps if they are not used to towing and the effects of different weight distribution," he says.

For further information about this media release or the name of local fitting specialists, please contact All Air Suspensions, 10 Angas St, Meadowbank, Sydney 2114 ph (02) 9807 7641, fax (02) 9807 7643 www.allair.com.au All Air Suspension can also supply contacts for national availability of the product.