Air ride suspension on 65 G10

I was wondering about putting air bags on my G10. Does anyone have any experience with this? I need new suspension anyways, so I was thinking about going this route. I know it's not too cheap though. I don't necessarily want to drop it to the ground, but how much more work would it be to do that? Can anyone recommend a kit for a G10? How low can I go without it becoming a major job? If someone has some advice/experience, I'd love to get some feedback from you. Thanks!

No kits that I'm aware of. All depends on how much you want to spend and your fabrication skills. you can bag the front with the stock axle and a single leaf (as a locator) or build a 4 link system to bolt to your axle. or you can graft in an IFS. your tires will hit the wheel wells before you lay out (unless you are running crazy short tires). don't let that demotivate you though. anything can be done.

Ok. I am no fabricator, nor would I consider myself a mechanic. I have a friend's father who is a retired mechanic and maybe some sort of fabricator. He says that he could do it for/with me. I just don't know what we/he(mainly him) would be getting into. I would like it done right, I don't want to spend the most money or the least money on it. I would like to get an idea of what parts would cost and the right parts to get. I do have around $5K at the moment. Is it gonna take more then that?

I do have air bags on the rear of my 65 and a sway bar,,,,,,,but they are  there to do work,,,,not look pretty,,,,,,,

Excuse me Doni, what did you do to mount your spare under there and how do you get at it? As far as the bag project, check out heinz57's thread on his bagged '66 and see if you think you can handle the job.

I got tired of tripping over it in the van and bumping into things when it was hanging on my rear doors, so I put a long carriage bolt through the floor and bolted the spare to the bottom of the floor,,,,,,I have undo the u bolts on the driveshaft and lower it down to let  the spare down ,,,,thats been like once in the last 15 years,,,,,its a full size 15" tire,,,,and my van is jacked up a bit in the rear,,,,,I would say,,,get one of the toy 16" Cadillac spares,,,,they fit and don't take up much space,,,,,,

recshopben wrote:I was wondering about putting air bags on my G10. Does anyone have any experience with this? I need new suspension anyways, so I was thinking about going this route. I know it's not too cheap though. I don't necessarily want to drop it to the ground, but how much more work would it be to do that? Can anyone recommend a kit for a G10? How low can I go without it becoming a major job? If someone has some advice/experience, I'd love to get some feedback from you. Thanks!

Just going with 1 or 2 leaf springs really won't gain a lot before it starts bending the spring backwards. Will still be off the ground 6-8 inches at the rockers and things just look unsafe at the springs. It also makes the pinion angle wacked out. I have been playing with one set up like this off and on until I commit to something else. The IFS and 4 link are the safest set ups. No easy path to lower that doesn't compromise something else working with the stock spring design.

You can put the van on a substantial forward rake with selective tire sizing alone (bigs and littles!) enough to scrape your front bumper on driveways..... take a leaf from each side in the front for a bit more lowering (but don't forget to add caster wedges to keep it wanting to go down the road straight!).... At this point you'll have the basic seventies look. To get extra appearance of lowness, you can put sidepipes on it.
IMO, you will basically be re-inventing the wheel to put serious air ride suspension on one of these vans because it's basically not possible without scrapping the leaf spring suspension and building entire four-link or ladder-bar setups with panhard bars.....
If you are committed to the idea of a bagged van-type vehicle, I'd recommend getting a 67-72 panel truck that has the correct coil suspensions already on them for easy airbag conversion...
I've been eyeballing the underside of my 69 van to do some lowering and notice that new holes could be drilled to move the front mounting of the rear leafs up substantially. Also, it looks like the front axle can be flipped on top of the front springs. Both of these mods would create a substantial "static" drop. I also was surfing the monroe shock catalog and found several air shocks in appropriate lengths and mounting to fit the front of my van and use to stiffen/raise the van a bit if the flip is too low to be practical.....I'm WAAYY ahead of myself here since the van is not running yet, but I'm trying to develop a complete plan ahead of time.....

Hey i did this! four link the rear and built my own front wish bone setup. I think i spent about $300.00 altogether i also put a four wheel disc set up off a 2000 grand prix now that was way easy. Need help ill tell you how to set this up and it will blow your mind how cheep and easy this is.

Company called Air Lift makes universal kits for trucks that should work with a van.  Jegs sells them as does eBay, under $300 for the rear kit.  Like these:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Toyota-T-100-PU-1993-98-2WD-1969-95-2-4WD-Pickup-Air-Bag-Kit-AL59502-/270728163664?pt=Motors_Car_Truck_Parts_Accessories&hash=item3f08a7f150&vxp=mtr
But they make several different models for small trucks....find the one that best fits the van's frame, these are close, call them....

ztoyman you know we are going to want to check this out , details pictures are a bonus