04:14:16pm, Tuesday, May 14, 2024
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Are air ride frontends legal?
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Does anyone know if an air ride frontend is against the rules in any association? And if so why would it be? |
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Re: Are air ride frontends legal?
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Anonymous User
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How would you garantee that your hitch height wouldn't change after being checked? (I didn't let the air out! .. Honest) 
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Re: Are air ride frontends legal?
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Registered: 11/22/2008 Posts: 181 |
I've wondered the same thing, seen a couple tractors with it and what is stopping them from letting the air out? they dont check hitch height after a hook that Ive ever seen. |
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Re: Are air ride frontends legal?
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Posts: 508 |
If any thing,having air ride will hinder performance,not improve! why? well most serious competitors will carry their front end just off the track as they pull down the track,thus reducing hitch height marginally! now if you use air ride, and pressurize it enough to carry all that ballast up front,the air ride will cause your front end to rise sooner which again lowers hitch height! limiting suspension travel will help marginally. as to hitch height changes? with hitch distance at 18" and front wheels forward close to 9-10' raising or lowering the front even a foot will make very little change in the overall height! that said having suspension would help reduce the hard hits that the front wheels are subjected to occasionally! just a few thoughts. |
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Re: Are air ride frontends legal?
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Anonymous User
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Jim, I agree with your thoughts. I wonder if they are trying to keep the front wheels as close to the track as much as possible to help with steering (stay off brakes) as well as keep from front end 'bounce.' Hard front end bounce can reduces pulling distance. I always thought that having some sort of dampening suspension could help increase distances on some runs. |
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Re: Are air ride frontends legal?
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I hope you keep on thinking that! |
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Re: Are air ride frontends legal?
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Anonymous User
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Lustik's Bullet runs an air ride front end. |
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Re: Are air ride frontends legal?
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asdf
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yes it is illegal in either ppl or ostpa i can understand why they did it |
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Re: Are air ride frontends legal?
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Anonymous User
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asdf, could you share your understanding why they feel it's illegal? I'm curious. |
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Re: Are air ride frontends legal?
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Its the typical pulling mindset, If I get beat by a guy who has something, or who has thought of something that I didnt, I need him to be outlawed! I have built tractors with airride front axles, it is an advantage, and it has nothing at all to do with the Hitch ZERO! Check the hitches after a airide tractor pulls see whats going on is that too hard? We need to be checking more things such as this anyway! The tractors I have built have a self contained system, with NO PUMP ONBOARD! And one spot to air up the system, not easily accessed by the crew! I bet if another well known builder from the Hoosier state tried it first, it could be mandatory! Here is another attribute too! Safety, thats right, just a couple to three inches of suspension cushions the shock of the frontend coming down so much its unreal, frontend breakage and frame damage could be a thing of the past if engineered and built right. And remeber this post comes from a background of expirence in having done it and proved it works, blast away!
BB |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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Anonymous User
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I know if I was building a tractor ... I would incorporate an air suspession into the front axle to reduce frame stress. It's all in the design. Good post Stormy! 
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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asdf
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oh if i built a chassis id install air ride if it was illeagal i am not sayin its a good idea but yea theres always gana be someone out there that you beat thats goin to cry and complain that your cheating you can do everything by the book and if you have a good running consistant top 3 tractor people are goin to say your cheating its life i dont agree with the rule meangreen but what are we goin to do rules are rules |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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puller 12000
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OSTPA outlawed them this past year |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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Anonymous User
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is not one of the greatest challenges in pulling balancing the tractor so that the front end hovers about 6-12 inches above the ground? i think that if they allow air ride front ends, then this could take away from the art of balancing a tractor. I understand that sometimes something happens and your front end gets up and you slam it down, but if your doing that every pull and think that an air ride system is going to fix that or help you be easier on components, you are wrong! if a tractor is balanced right, it has no need for an air ride system. you watch the veterans who have been around, they hover their front end and set it down as lightly as it came off. |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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Anonymous User
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I agree with your post that most balance Ok, but the lighter classes bounce around more and what about the TWDs? I think the mini's should be allowed some 'give' in their front ends ... but then again maybe they would be worse. Just thinking out loud. Some tracks (mostly county fair tracks) have had some wild rides!! (inconsistency of track)
I'd still like to hear some reasons why they're illegal. I understand with the skid plates under front axle that we have less frames in the dirt. ie turnovers. |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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Registered: 03/31/2008 Posts: 762 |
Just like most things, someone doesn't understand or correctly understand the physics & engineering so they outlaw it. |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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AirRide
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I don't care if they're legal or not, but it needs to be officially decided. Young Buck and Silver Bullet both have them and there's a definite advantage if your weight is off OR if you have a way to dump air after your hitch is measured.
I don't see them as being much of an advantage and they do present multiple opportunities for cheating with them. |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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Registered: 03/25/2008 Posts: 2,526 |
Well, without sitting down and drawing a detailed diagram, lets just simplify and do some basic math (I know all the points are not in the same horizontal plane, but that requires a little more work and I think you’ll see you still get similar results):
- Max wheel base from rear axle to front axle is 114” - Min drawbar length is 18” from rear axle to hitch point 114”/18” is ratio of 6 1/3 to 1. Meaning to raise the drawbar 1” you would need to drop the front of the tractor down by 6 1/3”. It seems to me that most people would notice if someone tried to drop the front of their tractor a half a foot. Here’s one other thing to consider: the ski bars that are mandated by both NTPA and PPL are 4” off of the ground and must be attached to the chassis and not the suspension. Meaning… if you tried to drop the front down the most you could gain would be ½” of drawbar with your ski bars right in the dirt. As a side note: I spent some time at the NFMS talking with Brad Moss from the Young Buck team about their front suspension. I think their design is the nicest I’ve seen. It’s clean, engineered extremely well, looks great, and takes some stress out of the chassis. It’s also the only air-ride setup that has independent front suspension. If I was building a tractor I’d definitely use the Young Buck tractors’ front end as my benchmark. If anyone gets a chance this summer they should check it out, it’s as beautiful and clean as the rest of the tractor. I also got a chance to see under the hood, and it’s as clean or cleaner on the inside, as it is on the outside. Should there be a rule on ski bars? No. They are just another innovation that some will adopt and some won’t. Is it going to make anyone go any further down the track? Most likely not even an extra inch. They are just another option, to some they are a novelty, and to some a necessity. Jake Morgan Owner, PULLOFF.COM Independent Pulling News This page is a free service. The cost is covered out of my pocket. It takes a great deal of time and a fair amount of money to keep this website going. Donations for: photos, classified ads, forum discussion, etc... are appreciated. Side Note: We are no longer accepting PayPal donations. They have changed their terms of service and stated they would fine PayPal users for spreading "misinformation" and "hate, violence, racial or other forms of intolerance that is discriminatory". PayPal did not provide definitions for some of these vague terms. Woke corporate policies regarding "misinformation" could result in an automatic fine of $2,500 which would have been removed directly from the customer’s PayPal account. PayPal did backdown from some of their policies but quietly implemented portions of them in later terms of service. A financial institute has no right to monitor social media accounts or speech. This is unacceptable and I'll no longer do business with PayPal. |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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Thanks Jake for your compliments on our work on Young Buck, it took alot of Cad time and head scratching and hoping it would work, turns out it works awesome. Good post too laying out the math of what actually could occurr. Sorry to get a little hot in my previous posts, but me and my guys put our hearts into our work, and to have people accuse us of cheating or that being our intention, instead of us being innovators in the sport it really pushes my blood pressure up! Everyone needs to remeber that someone had to push it further or take the lead in every aspect of what pulling has evolved to over many years, are they cheating, or are they innovating pushing the limits making rules be defined or redefined to accomodate what is best for safety, performance, and the health of the sport! Technology is ever changing, as a builder my mindset is if I keep doing the same thing because it works soon I will become irrelevant and outdated, so I ,as do all good builders push the limits of what has been done or what can be done, this is how we shape the tecnology of the pulling vehicles.
BB |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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Anonymous User
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Just read your post Stormy and Jake. Good Job! I like to see innovation advances, especially for safety. |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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Dang it Jake, you have to bring common sense into this! |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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Registered: 03/31/2008 Posts: 762 |
Bob,
What about doing the same thing with coilover shocks? You should be able to accomplish the same thing & by setting the rebound on the shock to real slow it might actually be better both as the front lifts & as it bounces. Also eliminates the concern about cheating by air 'leaking' out of the system. |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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I am actually looking at that right at the moment, figuring spring rates and such to see what we would need to accomodate it, it actually takes a bunch of psi to work, dont know at this moment if the available coil springs can work but may be a possibility.
BB |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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Anonymous User
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Jake, good point; but you're making 2 assumptions that are risky. The first is that everyone is running an 18" drawbar, the second is that people wouldn't do whatever they could to squeeze out even a quarter inch of drawbar height.
Say I'm running a 24" drawbar, that makes my ratio 4.75:1. I can assure you I could dump an inch to an inch and a half of air to get 1/4" of drawbar height without anyone knowing. PS hitches are 20" from the ground at hook point. 1/4" is 1.25% if I'm figuring correctly and that's more of a difference than one might think. Ask any puller what he'd give for 1/4" more hitch than everybody else. The other advantage to these is that they are a tremendous help in not unloading the rears if you get some bounce due to mis-weighting or a bad track or sled setting. |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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Registered: 03/25/2008 Posts: 2,526 |
You are correct, there is no maximum drawbar length in the rule book, just the 18" minimum length. I don't want to get into a huge drawbar discussion, but there's a reason why it's limited on the minimum rather than the max… ones an advantage and one isn’t.
There's also a maximum wheelbase but no minimum (limited for the same reason as above). So theoretically someone could dramatically shorted the wheelbase and lengthen the drawbar and more dramatically change hitch height. I honestly think they would lose more distance by making the other changes than they would gain by cheating and changing their front axle height. As for the bounce issue… should we limit front tire size? According to that same logic, guys with 7.5 tires are at a huge disadvantage compared to guys with 11’s on the front. That brings up rim size, should we allow 16” front rims with larger front tires? They have more capacity to absorb bounce. Should we mandate a front tire pressure to make sure everyone bounces the same? It sounds a little absurd to me. If it does limit bounce isn’t it a safer option? If it's safer, and a huge advantage then everyone should build air ride. If the air ride is adjustable from the seat then yes, they could cheat, they could also go across the scales with all the weight on the back, then act like they misread the track the move weight forward… it would accomplish the same thing. Or… should we seal front tires because they could be inflated to 40 psi for the scales/drawbar measurement to …lower their hitch height down to 20” and then have the air dropped down after they get the drawbar measured to raise the hitch back up above 20”? There will always be ways to cheat, but outlawing something out of fear is no way for a sanctioning body to govern. If it’s a closed system and it’s not connected to anything except the suspension then its fine, and it’s just like tires, hood shocks, or any other part of the chassis. If lines go other places then I’d say that it falls under the compressed gases clause in most rule books… and therefore illegal. As for them being an actual advantage... there's no evidence or data to support that argument. Jake Morgan Owner, PULLOFF.COM Independent Pulling News This page is a free service. The cost is covered out of my pocket. It takes a great deal of time and a fair amount of money to keep this website going. Donations for: photos, classified ads, forum discussion, etc... are appreciated. Side Note: We are no longer accepting PayPal donations. They have changed their terms of service and stated they would fine PayPal users for spreading "misinformation" and "hate, violence, racial or other forms of intolerance that is discriminatory". PayPal did not provide definitions for some of these vague terms. Woke corporate policies regarding "misinformation" could result in an automatic fine of $2,500 which would have been removed directly from the customer’s PayPal account. PayPal did backdown from some of their policies but quietly implemented portions of them in later terms of service. A financial institute has no right to monitor social media accounts or speech. This is unacceptable and I'll no longer do business with PayPal. |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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Anonymous User
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I couldn't believe it either, but you are mistaken on longer drawbars not being an advantage; especially on a good track. I know of 4 PS's running a longer hitch like I describe and they'll probably never go back. So long as you're weighted properly, it helps without question.
Watch some video of Silver Bullet sometime on a rough pass and tell me that his airbags aren't a major advantage in keeping the rear planted. I do think its a good idea and yes, bigger fronts with less air would do the same thing less effectively. I think though that gas shocks with coil springs would eliminate the possibility of cheating OR air bags with NO lines to them. Do I think Lustik's or Moss & Stratton are cheats? NO. I do not. I think they are hard workers, learners and innovators and assets to the sport. Would it be easy under the current rules to adjust your hitch height? Yes, it would. I do think that this is a potential issue that rulebooks would do well to visit and I don't see how you could argue that point. |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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gtpuller200756
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Stormy, Just an Idea I got today sitting in class, HAHA. How much of a stress difference is there between the abuse a monster truck lets say Grave Digger, puts on the shocks, compared to a hard frontend hit from lets say a Prostocker? Might there be a way, you could take one of the big king coilovers from a monstertruck, and make a minuature version? Just a thought, I had. Shoot maby you could get ahold of the Digger Boys and maybe they could help you figure something out! Just a thought, Blast away at the idea, I know somebody will think its stupid!
Kyle |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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Kyle,
Its not a stupid train of thought at all, matter of fact it shows this thing has kinda got peoples wheels a turnin and thats what pushes the sport foward, till somone throws a tantrum and tries to bring the rulebook cops into it! One thing I really like about the air is it doesnt exhibit the "bounceback reaction" the way a spring does, like for instance on every Semi on the road today, air bags have been a huge improvement in their ride, alot smoother and easier on drivers and loads. This same thing applies in pulling the smoother a pass can be, the further your gonna go! And yes the vetrans do a great job of balancing their vehicles, but with the sleds being as "heavy" as they are now, in the heavier classes such as Superfarm and Prostock, it is an advantage to keep that frontend down and drawbar up, and use the gearing of the tractor for the second half of the track! Balancing a frontend 1-3 inches off the track is very much more difficult then say 8-10 inches. Keep thinking guys there is still much improvements to be made, I have some cad drawings of chassis I have dreamed up that would scare the crap outta Richwine/ Mears and soforth, but I would bet a dollar to a donut that a Component Chassis 10yrs from now will look way different then what we are building now! BB |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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Stormy,
Thanks for the great Imput, Do you care if I use your information that you posted on here, for my Junior Research project paper? I think it is a great topic to include about the "Technological Advancements in Tractor Pulling" If there is a way I could use your information it would be greatly appreciated, I would just need some Information from you for proper citation of the quotes! I definately see you as a great innovator of the Sport! Kyle |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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Kyle,
Yes I will help, have helped several young fellas with such for college. Email me at Full Pull BB |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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CPR
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Agree, not stupid. Al Childs has had coilovers on his mod up here for 10 years or more. The travel on each side is different and I think the spring rates might be, too. Had to do with compensating for engine torque on the chassis. I had it explained to me a few years back and have forgotten the details. Did it help? I don't know, he won his fair share, maybe something to talk about while he was working elsewhere to be better. The old racer's ruse and no I am NOT suggesting he was cheating!
Al Childs Zippy Mod |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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Anonymous User
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I have to say that looks nice on that tractor but on a prostock or superstock? im not sure that people would be able to get by the looks of it. one of the main things that people find attractive about pulling is the beauty of the machines but i wonder if they put a set of springs on the front that it will make them look too much unlike a tractor and turn those die hards who like the old school looking tractors off. Now mind im not talking about the functionality of them, i think they would work great, i think the air ride may be a better option because of the way it can be concealed but from a visual standpoint, on anything but a modified, i think a coil over suspension may be a little much. |
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Link to Young Buck Prostock @ Louisville 2011
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Anonymous User
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Below is a link to picture from louisville showing the airshocks on the young buck prostock. I think they look better than I thought would.
DPS Young Buck Prostock Air Shocks |
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Re: Link to Young Buck Prostock @ Louisville 2011
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CPR
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From straight on the side, the tire would conceal that. Pretty clean install. Not sure I'd have even seen it at first look at that photo. |
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Re: Are air ride front ends legal?
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Anonymous User
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With distances being measured in thousands of a foot, it takes just a little fine tuning to squeak out another position or two. This is a game of less than an inch sometimes.
Just another thought, what about a variation to the torsional axle system on recreational vechical trailers. Would have less travel, (or maybe could be enhanced) but some dampening effect. The coil over shock system seems (to me) to have some challenging issues to maintain a static set height everytime. I'm sure someone with a sharper mind (and CAD machine) than me will figure out a way though. I remember two video interviews with Tim Engler many years ago where he made some hitch adjustments (legal ones) to increase his tractor's balance because of track condictions that were not favorable to his tractor. (Less is sometimes more.) |
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