Fancy Shocks on Trucks
 

I really like the Colorado, but the one thing that is not good is the ride quality on rough roads. The shocks are shit, and it's really starting to annoy me.

The cool kids seem to be buying custom valved external reservoir shocks from places like Accutune. I don't need a big lift or the ability to do high-speed baja-ing, but as you would expect, they claim the better shocks translate to better ride quality on rough roads as well.

It'll end up being like $2500 for the non-compression adjustable (in the truck world "adjustable" usually means height adjustable.) For $700 more you can get both high- and low-speed compression adjustments.

Rebound is never adjustable. Apparently trucks and cars are very different beasts. The folks at Accutune said that on trucks the focus is on keeping the wheel on the ground. Truck suspension has a lot of travel and you want the wheel to go down into the hole ASAP, then control it on the way up. You contain body roll using low-speed compression and sway bars instead. :dunno:

It's a lot of money so I'm not sure I'm going to do it. But I'm tempted.

That or trade it in on a new Ram Rebel. (Then in 6 months I can post asking about suspensions for my Ram :lol:)

For what it’s worth, $250 of Bilstein was magical on my truck. And then Sulastic ride shackles, which really soften up the leaf springs when empty.

What do the Sulastic ride shackles do? Create a small range of softer travel before the full spring rate kicks in?

Yes. The problem with leaf springs is that they are at their stiffest unloaded, so the sulastics add softness in the unloaded part of the spring travel.

They aren’t without trade offs - you get more axle wrap with them. Worth it, IMO. Would not be worth it if I always had 500-1000lbs. in the bed.

I put off-the-shelf Bilsteins on the Ram. They were transformative. It rides better unloaded than my old Chevy 2500 did with the trailer hooked up. I don't remember how much they were but I want to say on the order of $400. Sam actually had the cheapest pricing when shipping was included.

My experience with stiffer sway bars has been that they degrade the ride of pretty much every vehicle.

I was about to pull the trigger on the Sulastic shackles for the Chevy, but decided to replace the whole truck instead :)

You guys are kind of talking me into Eibach/Bilsteins...

Bilsteins 5100 are popular on 4-runners. More about making it easy to lift then ride quality though.

Well I couldn't talk myself into billsteins. I ordered the fox 2.5's w/ dual speed adjusters. They're custom valved by Accutune for my truck for mostly street use, but I'll be able to control the high and low speed compression up or down from there.

I can't explain how this makes any sense. But I wanted to see what they're like, so here we go.

Should be an improvement nonetheless

Something to look forward to. You’re probably in that truck a lot.

If someone sold a mid-level, high quality, adjustable (or custom valved) shock for the Colorado I would have bought it. But they don't.

I'm really curious how it'll drive. Some people say they're "softer and more comfortable". Others say "firmer but more controlled and pleasant". Other say it handles "like a sports car". :speechle: We'll see.

I don't understand adjustable shocks on a truck, but I'm sure they'll be fine

What makes less sense - adjustable shocks for a truck.. or a heavy duty off road racing shocks for a guy who doesn't go off road?

I like the adjustability so I can experiment and figure out what works for me. Everyone says the these shocks are generally too firm for most people on the street. So do I tell Accutune to "soften them up"? Or are the people who say they're too firm just pansies, and I'll like the firm ride? I have no clue. And I don't want to have to uninstall them and mail them back each time I want to try something new. But once I figure out a setting I like, I doubt I will move them much.

Unless I start a new hobby of off-roading just to make use of the suspension I just installed. Stranger things have happened. :lol: I do actually kind of want to try off-road trail driving.. but there's nothing legal in this area. I doubt it's my thing anyway.

Both, when compared to an OTS shock with a lifetime warranty that works well on the street out of the box :dunno:

Firm shocks on a truck are a disaster. Get the Bilsteins. Seriously. They are really good and really cheap.

Getting shocks that suck for way more money is dumb.

But he needs the look...

I think that Bilstein 4600s are probably the best choice, but if he needs pretty, the Bilstein 5100s are super pretty.

Too late. I read quite a few reports of colorado owners not happy with the billstein/eibach's for street driving. Bad info? Maybe. Or they just suck for the Colorado? Maybe. Should I have tried them first? Probably, but I didn't.

The theory is that these won't be too firm and won't suck. That's why I didn't go with a stock tune, or it would have. We'll find out. If indeed they do indeed suck, then yeah that'll suck.

Nah, couldn't care less. If anything it's kind of embarrassing. :bustingup

Eibachs? Like springs? Or bars? I would certainly not advise swapping springs or sway bars on a street truck. Both are likely to degrade ride quality significantly.

No, just shocks.

Before I ordered you guys were pro bilstein, but I didn't see any coilover hate. Now you're making me nervous these are going to suck. I expected them to be far into the finishing returns bucket but I obviously don't want them to be worse than the $300 option.

I'll give them a call Monday and express my concerns, and see what they say.
When I talkd to them last time they seems pretty confident that I'd be happy with the tune they were giving me. But it doesn't hurt to double check. Buried in the valving for me, but they haven't been yet.

They also fix things after the sale if you're not happy. Revalve, re-spring, etc. That would be a pain, but I'm not stuck with something I don't like.

Okay. The Eibach comment confused me.

Just reading the title of this thread had me chuckling....

Rancho in the F250 and Bilsteins in the Yukon - those have worked out great. And are not fancy. Just good.

OK, so you weren't as right as you thought you were... but you were still more right than I was.

Round 1: Nick 1, Accutune 0.

I installed the shocks and at full soft (both low and high speed compression) it was not a good recipe. The body control was meh, and yet the small bump compliance wasn't great either. A bit of a floaty ride and still not plush over bumps.

I called Accutune and spoke someone who knew what he was doing. He looked at the valving given to me and said, "oh yeah, that's a stiff setup. You ordered while Ryan and I were out of town. The guy who set up your valving is new and made choices he shouldn't have." :rolleyes:

But he was super nice and spent almost an hour on the phone with me, explaining how he's going to soften it up a lot and give it a very different characteristic. He'll plug one of the bypasses to give me more low speed compression, and then use a flutter stack to have less high speed compression. He insists that when he's done my, it will be far more pleasant and that my desired street setting will fall somewhere in the middle of the range of both adjusters.

So it absolutely sucks that they shipped me a shitty valving and I have to deal with this because I called at the wrong time. That's fucking lame. But he somehow quelled my rage by being super nice, no nonsense, honest about the mistake, and being committed to make it right. That said he's only paying for shipping 1 way (these fuckers are heavy). I debated making a scene over it, but it's not clear it's worth it. I mostly just want to end up with the ride I'm looking for.

Oh and he insisted that even what I have now is better than what I'd have gotten from Bilstein. He says they're valved far more digressively, so you get more body control at the cost of harshness. I've read multiple people in the colorado forums complain about the bilsteins as well. :dunno:

6 month update.

I sent them back (twice... long story) and the guy tuned them on his girlfriend's Colorado. They're the best recipe for street driving that he could produce.

The result? Hit and miss

The bigger the bump, the better they are. Hit a speed bump at like 10 mph and you think, "Holy crap that should have been way worse than that! These things are amazing."

But the large pistons have a lot of static friction. This means it takes a decent amount of force to get the piston moving initially. So small bumps in the road are transmitted to your ass more than you'd think they should be. But I hit a small highway crack and I'm like, "Damn, I shouldn't have needed to feel that"

So I'm torn. It's fun to have shocks that can handle anything. I find myself intentionally hitting bumps and potholes just for kicks. But not being able to absorb small/medium highway cracks on a street vehicle is pretty stupid.

The stock shocks are best at the small stuff - because they basically don't do anything. :lol:

If I weren't so lazy I'd try a set of bilsteins. I've read good reports, but also a lot of negative ones (for the colorado) saying they're harsher than stock, yet still blow through their travel and bottom out on big bumps.

But for now, I'm too lazy to change anything so they stay.

you know you bought a truck, right?

Does a midsize count as a truck? :D

Have you considered putting 500lbs. in the bed?

Also, is your colorado leaf sprung? I'd look at Sulastic shackles if so.

How are the secondary oscillations?

I sometimes miss my JGC; it's go anywhere character, decent interior (at least up front) and diesel/ZF-8 combo... But, I don't miss lane changes; those were awful up to and including my accident.

Cool stuff there, but looks like they only list Colorado's til 2010 not the newer version

And I know I said it much earlier in this thread, but I still can't believe how much better my 1500 rides with 4 psi less in each tire than GM "recommends"

GM's recommended psi is for max load, I rarely carry much weight. When I am getting a load of top soil or mulch I just pump them up.

Plus I like how it annoys Onstar that thinks my air pressure is low

LOL. I run 30 psi under the recommended rear pressure in my HD. I figure that the front axle carries 4,000lbs. on 50psi, so the rear can carry the 3,000lbs. empty weight on 50 as well. (Recommend pressure is 80!)

Tire wear is WAY better this way, too.

Wait, what? 80 PSI?

Colorado's recommended is 35. I'm running 34/33.

I can try 30 :dunno: At what point to 255/65R17 truck tires start to get weird?

Doesn't that require me to remove 500 lbs of stuff every time I want to use it as a truck?

With the stock shocks it can get a bit out of control. With the Fox shocks, handled very well.

And your Duramax weighs what, about half of my 5.7 V8? :)

My F550 had air suspension on the rear axle, I didn't want to mess with air pressure on the dually tires, so I mounted a second limit switch on the suspension so I could run different air pressure on the air bags between loaded and unloaded. My 5th wheel pin weight was about 5600 pounds! Truck drove so smooth when loaded, but until I added the second switch it sucked driving the truck after unhooking the 5th wheel.

I mean, it depends on what you want to use it as a truck for. If you're running into load limits, then yes. If it's a space issue, than a big piece of steel plate will weigh it down without impacting available volume.

But mostly, I was thinking that you'd try it for starters and see. You know, throw a couple sets of wheels in the back and see if it rides better.

And yes, the specified rear tire pressure for my truck is 80 pounds per square inch. With 50 up front, which makes that easy. If they are running identical pressures front and rear, you aren't going to have the opportunity to do much.

I'll also note that the Michelin all season tires ride a lot better than the Bridgestones it came with, or the Bridgestone A/T tires I was talked into putting on (and regretted).

I air down the ram rear tires in the winter but in the spring they live at 80, which is the common max load inflation pressure for a load range E tire.

It does ride better with the rear at 60psi.

For a mid size truck if be hesitant to go lower than the recommended pressures. The side walls on those tires are generally super weak.