Demountable camper group

these Air suspension additions, we can see they are mentioned nearly all occasions so whats involved please, that link above to Markle for example says that gauges and a pump are not included, is this a pointless extra if you have an air supply to hand,
and also, does this need specialist to fit?

Alexd wrote:these Air suspension additions, we can see they are mentioned nearly all occasions so whats involved please, that link above to Markle for example says that gauges and a pump are not included, is this a pointless extra if you have an air supply to hand,
and also, does this need specialist to fit?

I didn't buy a compressor - I have the pipes taken out to a pair of valves at the back of the truck and pump them up with a foot pump or similar. Though I never keep much pressure in my airbags

Here is a pictorial record of what I did to fit mine:

http://www.rv.net/forum/index.cfm/fusea ... 857169.cfm

Steve.

Alexd wrote:these Air suspension additions, we can see they are mentioned nearly all occasions so whats involved please, that link above to Markle for example says that gauges and a pump are not included, is this a pointless extra if you have an air supply to hand,
and also, does this need specialist to fit?

If the air springs are only to add a little to the effective spring rate you can manage without the compressor and use a small pump as Steve has done. The bags are small and the pressure (should be) low so it's a totally practical solution.

However (and assuming the air springs are not pumped up to the max just to keep the towbar off the deck) with an onboard compressor and control system you can tweak the pressure to cope with different driving and loading conditions which is rather nice and you'd be surprised how often you make small adjustments. Add to that the ability to instantly adjust the pressure each side to level the rig up for the night though and the argument for spending the little extra is quite compelling. We much prefer our campers to hotels for both holidays and business trips so spend a lot of time in them, typically minimum sixty nights a year. At the end of a long drive the ability to level up quickly (and discretely) for the night is really appreciated

It's worth mentioning also that we've found most truck springs get tired quite quickly so if you have 10 year old truck for example, replacing the springs with new (or uprated) ones might be a good place to start. A recent example is a 6 year old HiLux where new springs lifted the car by around 20mm in it's unladen state and almost halved the depression when loaded. The difference was much greater than anticipated and it made me wonder how many air assisted setups are in place or being abused purely to compensate for sacked out springs?

Best wishes

Gary

Sounds as though you aren't convinced that you need them at all. Perhaps your camper is not so tail heavy as others?
While I want to have airbags if necessary - I don't want to ruin the ride the rest of the time.

Toshbins wrote:Thanks Madmountain.
I'm going round a mixture of new Demountable dealers, secondhand sellers and forum members, getting an idea of the merits of different makes and layouts of campers. All in this country so far, but maybe a trip to Germany would be useful. I've seen Apollo, Northstar, Tischer and Ranger so far. going down to see Gary and his Lely next week and have an SKarosser lined up too.
I'm also looking into the different makes of airbag available. Don't know if members have opinions of the best ones, or ones to avoid.

If you're down in Dorset and, depending on whether it's during this week you're coming down or next week, we're not too much further West, just outside Exeter. If you'd like to see our EC6, i'm available during the week starting the 16th.