Bags done. No blood. Easiest set of Airlifts I have ever done. 1 hour all in, set psi to 30 and will let it sit overnight and recheck in the morning.
THANK you!! I never got mine installed before my trip and this should make it much easier/better on my lifted JT. $50 for 2 + $16 shipped to NJ makes them seem a bit salty for what they are.In case anyone is still searching for some additional spring spacers to use with the gladiator airlift bags, I found these at Michigan Truck Spring:
https://www.truckspring.com/Search.aspx?keyword=ail09113
I followed this procedure , made it a piece of cake .. took me about 30 min to get both sides in... and ran the lines to the license plate area. I used push to connect values .I got the Air Lift kit 60830 listed for the Gladiator and successfully installed in my Mojave this morning. Taking tips from others (thanks!) and pulling on my chin while under the truck for some time, I came up with a few more tips that might help others in the future.
Knowing the air bags must be deflated and folded in a way to fit through the spring openings and seeing a Ty-Rap used to hold the folded bag together I modified the procedure and the bags went in super easy with the air hose already prepped, avoiding trying to get tools inside the springs to attach the air lines.
There is a particular way to fold the bags by stepping in the middle and when deflated stepping on the top and bottom edges folding them inwards, then capping off the air barb so it won't inflate as in the picture below.
Then fold the bag over and attach a Ty-Rap around the lower section keeping the Ty-Rap lock mechanism near the open side of the bag. I found placing the bag on a step then putting my knee on the bag helped get the fold started.
Then measure the length of air hose needed to reach the T or fill valve and attach that to the bag making sure the sharp edges of the hose clamp face towards the open fold in the bag and can't poke into the bag when its squeezed. This picture shows the sharp hose clamp ears safely resting between the open fold in the bag.
Now fold down the upper part of the bag and attach a second Ty-Rap at the upper end of the bag as shown. Orient the Ty-Rap locks to the outer edge of the bag and trim off the excess Ty-Rap This will avoid snagging the Ty-Raps when the bag is pushed through the open spring coils.
At this point I inserted the big plastic doughnut that sits on top of the bag up into the spring and held it there with a scrap piece of sheet metal I had laying around. The sheet metal was about 1" wide and slightly longer than the springs are wide. After the doughnut is pushed all the way to the top of the spring and centered, I slid the sheet metal between the spring coils then rotated it screwing it towards the doughnut so it would rest on the coil and screwed it upward along the spring coil locking the doughnut at the top of the spring. You could probably use a thin wooden stick or plastic, etc, to accomplish the same thing.
I could then thread the air hose through the lowest coil opening up through the hole in the doughnut and the collapsed folded bag slid easily through the coil opening and bent upward in place inside the spring. with almost no effort I then removed the sheet metal holding the doughnut and it lowered onto the bag now held in place by the air hose going through it.
The rest of the install is normal stuff avoiding exhaust pipes and leaving some slack before Ty-raping down the air hose to the fill valve. I chose to put the fill valve in an existing hole that holds the plastic bumper trim on under the rear passenger tow hook as shown below. I pulled out the plastic rivet thing and enlarged the hole to accommodate the air valve. This location is recessed and should not snag anything for my type of off roading and you'll have to decide if its a good spot for you.
The compression is actually why I went with the IRO spacers. The steel doesn't deform like the poly does, though Im impressed that they only have a bit of deformation. I had a set of daystars on a KK and they actually deformed enough I had to replaced one side.The air bags arrived today - I haven't really opened and looked inside or at "directions/instructions" but have seen their videos. One thing that I find interesting is that in the video - they show the air line actually being in between the top of the spring and the stock spring isolator on top of the spring. Uh, pinching the line?
IS that really how it goes?
I'm a little concerned because when washing up my Daystar 3/4" spacers (for reinstallation on the rear, likely storing the front ones for now) I found that over the 2 years they were installed in my 2020, the springs had actually compressed the poly a bit and left impressions in the spacers and you could see and feel where the ends of the springs were on the spacers - and truck isolators.
If the springs can actually press into the poly spacers and isolators, I see the springs crushing the air lines if they go in like shown in the video and the pic below.
They literally wrap the line over the top of the spring and pop the factory isolator on it.
I've never seen any install video where they show the air line going straight up, all seem to go over the top of the spring or between coils. No one shows how they actually route. Or is that how they route?
I've not opened the box or looked at the instructions in the box - just the videos like this one.
I finally dug out the instructions and there was a bit about running the line through the hole in the top spring mount - odd tha the video shows the line going over the top of the spring and then that factory isolator going on over the top of the line! They should show the line going up through the center of the isolator. I guess being under the truck it makes more sense - ah, that hole up there looks like a good place for the line LOL.
nice! That is also a step I wish I did in retrospect haha
