Firestone Level Command - Single-Gauge w/ Heavy-Duty Compressor - Single Function

Video Transcript for Firestone Level Command Installation - 2002 Ford F-250

Today, on our 2002 Ford F-250, we're going to install part number F2097 from Firestone. This is Firestone's Level Command Single-Gauge with a Heavy-Duty Compressor. First thing we're going to do is go ahead and find the location for our control panel. On this install, we're going to mount it on the center of the dash down towards the bottom. We'll hold the control panel up, and we'll use a couple of sheet metal screws to make some holes in the bottom of the dashboard. That'll be our place where we're going to mount it.

We'll go ahead and take it back apart to make it easier to make our connections for now. Next, we'll go ahead and get the compressor ready to install. First off, we'll go ahead and install the barb fitting for the air intake that'll be at the center of the motor. We'll install a check valve onto the top of the pump at the compressor head. We'll thread those two together, and then we'll install the push-to-connect male fitting into the check valve.

Compressor's ready for now, we'll go ahead and take it to the frame of the truck and find a location to install it. We're going to install on the driver's side frame rail on the outside edge of the frame, just below the brake cable. We're going to hold the compressor up to the frame, and then with one-eighth inch drill bit, we'll go ahead and mark our holes to drill out. We'll drill out all the holes two-quarter inch. Then, we'll install our hardware to mount the compressor.

We'll run the screws from the outside to the inside. Our machines screw will have a flat washer on the outside running through the compressor mount and then through the frame. On the other side, we'll get a flat washer and a lock nut. We'll loosely install all fasteners, and then tighten it down for good. One thing you want to make sure of is that you don't over-tighten the mounts.

Over-tightening will crush the brass insert and the rubber isolator. If it's crushed, it'll reduce the vibration isolation. Next, we'll go ahead and start routing our air lines. Our first line we'll run will be from the air compressor to the control panel. What we will do is get our air line tubing ready to go. We'll also have to find a location that we're going to run our air line through from the inside to the outside. There's a grommet close to the floor that we'll go ahead and use. We're going to use a knife to cut a slit in it, so that we can run our air lines through. One end of the air line we'll go ahead and push through the grommet and into the engine compartment, and then the other end of the line will go to the control panel. Before we install it, we're going to take a cup of hot water and take the air line and set it inside. This way it will soften up the air line and make it pliable to install on the barb fittings. For our second air lines that's going to go from the control panel to the air bags themselves, we'll do the same thing. We'll work with one line at a time. We'll take our line from the compressor and run that to the barb fitting that's directly installed into the control panel. Then, the other line that'll go to the air bags will be connected to the barb fitting that's connected to two other short pieces of air line. We'll route those underneath the dash, and then over to our grommet, and then run it on through. Working one line at a time, we'll go ahead and run our air line first to our compressor. We'll run it along the wire harness, along the frame rail, and out to the compressor. Next, we'll go ahead and run our air line from the control panel to the air bags. Once again, we'll go ahead and run our air line along the frame rail, along the wire harness, and out towards our air bag on our driver's side. Air bags have been previously installed, so we're going to take our line, and we're going to run it directly into the first air bag. We'll take up any slack if we need to. Then, we'll go ahead and connect that air line going to the air bag, we'll cut it in half, and install our T. Take our air line and run it into the T. The air lines, once again, we'll just push together. The third part of our T, we'll run that to the passenger's side air bag. We'll run that over across the crossmember and down to the air bag. We'll also install a little piece of heat shielding to help protect the tubing, since that side is close to the exhaust. With our air lines ran, we can go ahead and zip tie them to help secure them into place. At this point, you may want to take a moment to rearrange the T to make sure the air lines fit as we want. It's very easy to remove the air line, you pull down the ring a little bit, and pull off the air line. We'll continue on zip tying our lines, going back up to the front and underneath the dash. Our last line to install will be our air line for our air filter. The air filter needs to be installed in a dry location, so we're actually going to run that in the inside of a cabin. We're going to take our black air line that comes with the kit, and we're going to run it into the back of the air filter. To prepare the air filter, there's a small bracket that's held on by two screws. We're going to go ahead and remove that bracket. Then, we'll install the barb fitting that comes with the kit onto the air filter. Then, we'll run the black line onto the barb fitting. We'll take our black line, then run it through the grommet from the inside to the outside. We'll push it all the way through, and once we're on the outside, we'll go ahead and run it to the air compressor. We'll run that one through the remaining barb fitting on the end. We'll take up our slack, have it sit to where we want it, then we'll zip tie it in place. We do want to leave a little extra slack up towards the front of the vehicle by the dashboard or firewall, so in the event that you have to change the air filter, you can pull the filter away from the wall and have plenty of air line to work with. With all of the lines and hardware installed, we can go ahead and start working on the electrical. We'll start off by the battery. We'll take our wire harness and the end with the fuse holder. We'll go ahead and attach that to the battery cable. We'll take the rest of the wire and run it by fender well and down through the firewall down to the frame. We'll end up routing this wire down to the compressor mounted to the frame. We'll go ahead and route the wires loosely. Our orange wire will be connected to the red wire on our compressor. The two ends just plug together, and we'll also tape them together as well. Then we'll attach our relay. We'll attach it to the body underneath the vehicle. We'll also cover it with some electrical tape to help secure it from the elements. The black wire from the compressor is our ground, and we'll attach that to the frame. We'll use a self-tapping screw to accomplish this. With those connections made, we'll go ahead and zip tie our wires to make them safe and secure underneath the vehicle. Now we'll take the other end of our white wire, and we're going to run that into the interior of the cab. We're going to make one more hole in the grommet that we used earlier to run our lines through. We'll cut a hole in the grommet, and we're going to take our extra piece of air line tubing, and we're going to push it through and use that to pull our white wire back through to the interior. That white wire is going to be connected to the control panel. Now, we have two white wires with spade terminals. This wire can connect to either one of them. We'll plug the two together and then on the other one, we're going to take the spade connector off and replace it with a ring terminal. We'll leave it alone for now. The other two wires that come off the control panel will be two black wires. Both are for illumination for the dial. To reach our illumination, the wire is going to be short, so we're going to add some length to them. We're going to use a white wire for our ground and our brown wire for illumination. It doesn't matter which wire we're going to connect up to for the light bulb inside, so let's go ahead and connect our wires up using some buck connectors. On the other end of these wires, one wire will be bare, the brown wire we'll leave alone, and the other white wire we'll go ahead and put a ring terminal on the end of it. We'll take down the fuse panel so we have access to the interior of the dashboard. Our brown wire for the illumination circuit, we're actually going to use the tow package on a truck to help us out. On a Ford factory tow package, there's an extra brown wire labeled illumination. We'll use that to illuminate our dial. We'll use the supplied quick connector to make the connection. We'll take our two wires and ring terminals, and we'll attach that to the sheet metal behind the dashboard. We'll use a self-tapping screw for that. At this point, we'll go back underneath the hood and connect our red wire to the battery, then we'll give it a test run. Once we're sure that everything works, we'll go ahead and take some time out to zip tie our wires and secure the wires to make them safe and secure out of the way. We'll also add some loom material to help protect the wires and make it a little bit better on the inside. Let's go ahead and try out the operation. We push up on the toggle, the compressor kicks on, and inflates the air springs. We push down on the toggle and it releases the air. We'll go ahead and turn on the illumination of the truck and you can see how the dial lights up. It looks like everything is working, and that will finish it for our install. There you have it for part number F2097 from Firestone on our 2002 Ford F-250.