air ride front end vs leaf spring

at one company i worked at,, (back in 1990..??) they had peterbilts, (ant eaters) and they had air ride.

many of the drivers complained, and the company removed that, and installed springs.

i liked mine, but to be honest, that must have been first generation..the ride was a bit more bouncy-bouncy than one would like.

i would imagine that since 1990...things have improved a whole lot....

but, i've been wrong before....

 

i have it on my coronado 132. I was a little apprehensive at first about getting the option but harrison gliders told me they came a long way since the earlier systems. So far so good i like it it def is better then the springs on my peterbilt i had prior to this truck. i dont have enough miles on it to give you any long term reliability yet but no complaints thus far

 

Did 400000 km with one on an 06 Western star. Rode better then my pickup and turned sharper to

 

How well do they drive. I have air ride on my Century. It will drive you nuts keeping it straight on the road. All suspension good, alignment. Everyone I ask about it says it is that airtec front axle.

 

glenn west im thinking part of your problem with wandering steering is you have your king pin way behind the axle. your teton is probably close to 5k in tongue weight and i think its unloading your front axle making it wander a bit. im close to 11k on my front axle and it feels planted and drives nice and straight so far im still very happy with the way mine performs

 

I still have 11k on front axle. The Smart car adds weight back to the front. It drives badly bob tail also

 

I prefer a hard front end.

We have so much air everywhere else that if we put bags under the front end I am afraid I wont know where the road is.

Usually that axle is the first to soak a bad bridge or some other problem. I am conflicted. I never had been issued a tractor with fancy front end air, considering that we company pukes never got much issue of anything at all for years.