Thniking about adding shocks

[Aaron Coffee]

I have been thinking about adding shocks, and have often wondered if a friction shock like the link would work.
http://www.speedwaymotors.com/Speedway-Friction-Shocks,3799.html
Haven't priced the monroe tube shocks locally but online I found them for half the price of friction shocks. With tube shocks they are best if mounted verticle as possible, correct(think I read that somewhere)? Would there be any advantage to mounting one in front of axle and one behind the axle(oppisite ends of axle)similar to a pickup or is that just to combat axle wrap on the pickup. My teardrop gets kind of bouncy on certain concrete roads. I have found I can get rid of the back and forth sway by driving the tow vehicle on one side or the other of the main grooves in the road(my theory is that the trailer has a narrower track width than the worn traffic grooves, and is searching for a groove to ride in)
Aaron

[jimqpublic]

My trailer loaded is close to 3,000 pounds. We have leaf springs and the Dexter shock mounting plates with Monroe trailer shocks. Way, way better on bouncy roads than it was before the shocks. I don't think it affects tracking except as affected by bumps.

[KCStudly]

Those friction shocks are pretty and pricey, but could solve a bunch of packaging issues if vertical space is limited. I've also seen homemade friction shocks; they're about as simple as it gets.

Everything I've ever read says that it is much preferred to have hydraulic shocks mounted within 30 deg from vertical. The flatter you go realative to the direction of suspension travel (which is not always perfectly vertical) the longer the shocks effective length will be (i.e. the travel of the shock will be a ratio of the travel of the suspension...the shock will seem longer for the same amount of suspension travel...the hypotenuse of a triangle instead of the long side), and the action of the shock will be correspondingly softer.

Best to set your shock mounts up so that the shock can not be over compressed at full stuff. I installed bump stops with about 1/2 to 3/4 inch additional compression before the shock bottoms out.

I believe you are correct; the staggered shocks are only meaningful on a drive axle.

[Aaron Coffee]

So is there a desired location to mount the shocks, either behind or in front of the axle? I looked underneath today and it looks like front would work better. Will hit auto parts tomorrow and hopefully can have the shocks and installed by my next mini vacation in 2 weeks. It seems to bounce the worst on new concrete stretchs, then telegraphs into the pickup and gets very annoying. Have decided to go with the Monroe tube shocks for price and after thinking about it, it will take about the same fabrications to mount either the tube shocks or the friction shocks.
Aaron

[Shadow Catcher]

I am working on coming up with a usable shock mounting set up. One of the tings we patterned it after is the Airstream shocks. I need to get longer air shocks the ones pictured are too short.

[Aaron Coffee]

Making mounts should be no problem, if I don't have the necessary bits of angle iron in the garage, I can get it at work, small sections like I would need only cost scrap price which is like .60cents a pound, and usually if it is under 5 pounds they usually say just take it and never mention it. If I dug around the garage I could probably find enough universal shock mounts to finish the project, but finding them might be another story.

[stix]

Placing them front or rear makes not a lot of difference,the optmum angle for a shock is vertical/straight up that is where it would work the best,but any thing up to a 45degree ange is ok any thing more than that and they become weaker/softer and don't do the job they are designed for correctly.

John

[Wishbone_aaa]

Visit the Outback Teardrop page for information on adding Monroe shocks
http://outbackteardrop.com/body8.html

Don

[jss06]

I used the monroe shocks and retrofit kit from the article above. Very easy to install and the trailer rides so much better now.

[Aaron Coffee]

got the Monroe shocks installed, I was able to find 8 semi complete (some where missing the nuts and washers) unviversal shock mounting bolts in the garage, and angle iron I had laying around, will take it out on a particularly bumpy stretch of road nearby for a test run on Sunday.