Air suspension problem (fault?)

Hello smart people.

I searched the forum and couldn't find an answer for my problem. Maybe someone knows where to look for it...

My air suspension is playing tricks on me. It works fine when driving, off-road mode works great, but... when I park it, it either stays pumped up, or it drops down very low. Not only that, the off-side goes down much lover than near side, and she looks like she couldn't take it no more and gave up... I have no idea when were the air bags replaced the last time, but I'm not sure if it would solve the problem, as they (sometimes) hold the pressure for long time, with no problems. Maybe some valve?

I would appreciate any sort of help

Sounds like one of the levelling valves is on its way out so might be worth checking them out

I read somewhere about the bags leaking where they fold over on there self and that causes them to leak sometimes but not always

i had this last year, eventually the air bag faiied completley, probobaly the air bag is leaking where it folds, try going underneath it with a spray full of soapy water to check for any sighn of leaks

if it tends to drop when left parked in a certain position do the soapy spray thing then, hope this helps, Paul

sounds just like what mine was doing, but i couldn't get myself to think it was the bags, as some days maybe a week and all ok, then 2 hours flat to the bottom, so i got 2 bags put em on and hey presto! all ok, stays up, problem solved, but before i took em off i did the soapy water trick, and found the leak, very slight hole,

Mine did this. Leaky (intermittent) airbag. Replace the pair and it will be sorted I reckon.

Put springs on it!

hoopfish said:

Put springs on it!

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Noooooooo.......lovely airbags are the way

Silverlandy said:

Noooooooo.......lovely airbags are the way

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A mate of mine has just replaced air for spring,got fed up with the sagging.
He reckons there is no difference and the spring conversion costs the same as replacing the bags!

Thanks a lot. I was planing on replacing them anyway, so I will wait till then. Good stuff love my air suspension!

If ya not shaw that it is the air bag ( but it will be ) and you still think it might be the height sensors . Park it somewhere level undo batt. Then stand on back bumper and give it a good bouncing . See if she goes down in any way .

possible height sensors mine started to sit at different heights and the on way home from work one end went up in air it was like a dragster going down the road found both were naffed replaced and no problems since.( he says with a prayer.) lol

Vanmancan said:

If ya not shaw that it is the air bag ( but it will be ) and you still think it might be the height sensors . Park it somewhere level undo batt. Then stand on back bumper and give it a good bouncing . See if she goes down in any way .

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Did it, she went down just like before. So, that proves the faulty air bags hypothesis, right?

kopara said:

Did it, she went down just like before. So, that proves the faulty air bags hypothesis, right?

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m8 just change the bags it is **** easy yeah the 120/140 quid is a downer but you can then work back from ther most faults are the bags. They will leak air if parked in a certain way and stay up if parked the other way round. Mine would o down one day then stay up for weeks. Changed bags no probs for 18 months no lop sided but think that is ride height sensor, which should have changed same time as bags don't forget to disconnect battery before touching anything electric on this system. you then increase the chance of not having to have it reset .

Well worth doing the airbags yourself . I did mine only a couple of months ago . Was the 1st time I did them only took me 2 hours taking it nice and slow , just remember to get the clips that hold the airbags in place at top (2 on each one ) as old ones offten come off bust. My air bags came with the new clips (paddocks.com) and also had the new push fit fittings on top , this just means you have to trim off the old olive fitting , then just a easy push fit into the airbag. Don't risk over working your compressor ! It really is a easy job

I was caught out the othe day; went shopping and as I arrived at my destination I felt some hard bumps. I thought the road was dodgy. When I got out I realised I was high up in the air. The offside was pumped right up and the nearside was low down. Crawled home hazards flashing (had to stop and replace a bulb too). I assumed that as the nearside was low down, I'd probably punctured the bag during recent repairs, I also knew I had a sensor falling apart on my nearside so thought that this could also be the problem.
I jacked her up, took off the wheel, undid the compressor air pipes to let the pressure out of the bags (I was worried the offside bag might explode) then quickly took out the nearside bag. It looked and felt fine. I inflated it a bit then with my finger plugging the inlet hole, immersed the entire bag in a bucket of water, pressing down on it so that the piston was pushing up inside the bag while looking for bubbles. F all wrong with the bag.
I put it back and turned my attention to the sensor. I knew the compressor was fine because it was pumping up the offside bag (too much so). The valve block could be faulty or the SLABS or, the part that sends the SLABS its info - the ride height sensor.
When I'd removed the sensor it was obviously in a mess. The bush that rides on the suspension arm had disintegrated and the bolt holes in the sensor body had corroded and burst. I wanted to diagnose the fault so had to improvise. I ordered a replacement sensor but while waiting for delivery, I used a nut to make a replacement bush and drilled open the bolt holes on the body and inserted/epoxied 2 nuts to take some new bolts. This all worked nicely but it made no difference to the problem. It continued to over inflate on the offside, however, the nearside now inflated to normal ride height. Hmmm, I reckon I've been messing with the wrong sensor. Sure enough, when I had the new one, I replaced the offside one with it and bob's your uncle!
One thing though, when jacking up chassis onto axle stands while bag is fully inflated, remember when it's back at normal inflation you might not have the same ground clearance you had when it was jacked up. I had a bit of a time getting my chassis back off the stand and wore myself out jacking the bloody car up and down struggling to get the stand out.:fighting: I had to resort to bricks under my trolly jack to get the thing off. Don't ask!

So, planning to get those bloody air bags changed in the near future, I went for a nice day out to Salisbury. I came back dragging my ass, driving 20m/h... I guess the "near future" is nearer than I expected....