All right today on this 2003 Chevrolet Express Van 2500 series, we are going to install part number F2337 from Firestone. They are Sport-Rite Air Helper Springs. We are going to start off by assembling the spring kit itself. We are just going to get it hand tight for now. We will get all of the accessories together and then we will install it on the vehicle. First off we will install this plate. We are going to put this disc on top of it. Then what is going to happen is our air bag is going to sit on top of that. This whole assembly is going to get attached to the bottom of the U bolts underneath the axle. Run the bolt through, the disc, and then our air spring. We are going to leave that loose for now. We will go ahead and install our air valve. We are going to cinch this one down tight. Then it is still flexible after it is tightened down, pretty neat. 01:14
Our top bracket is going to go back on. We can also go ahead and tighten these up too. The bottom bolt is what we are going to have to really leave loose. This is our sub assembly here. Lets go ahead and test fit it on the vehicle now. Right now we have got our wheel off. We have got it on a jack stand so we will go ahead and test it. This bracket on the bottom goes right on to the bottom of the U bolts and then on top we have got the parking brake cables in the way so we are going to have to disconnect that bracket and we will put the bracket back together after we are done with the air springs. All right lets go try it again. Put it up against the U bolts. Go ahead and install the nuts. Use a screwdriver to make a mark. We are going to be using an existing hole and this one here, mark that too. All right at our marked locations what we are going to do is drill 1/ 4 inch pilot hole and then follow up the appropriate hole for the fastener. These pilot holes need to be drilled up to 9/ 32 for the self tapping bolts. 03:03
In the oval hole here, the bracket lines up with that and we are just going to drill out through the back side of the frame. All right lets go ahead and enlarge the back side of the frame. Lets go ahead and run our bolt and our huge 3/ 8 thick washer through all the way through the frame. The same flat washer goes on the back side. The locking nut will go on top of that. We will not be able to do it too far with our hands. We will have to use a tool to run it down with. That is fine for now we will go ahead and start the other bolts into the frame. All right these bolts are actually self threading so you just got to get them started and put pressure behind them. All right for our bracket for our parking brake lines, what we are going to do is make the bolt do double duty. We actually drilled this out a little bit to accept it. It did not take much. Then we will just go ahead and put a flat washer behind that and then the bolt and thread everything back through. This arm above the hanger will set on top of the bracket and it will grab the lines. All right we will go ahead and tighten the nuts down now. Hand tighten and then 1/ 4 turn more is all you need. This bottom bolt we have got to do next. 04:40
We have got our assembly tightened down. Lets go ahead and start running the line. We are going to start from this access hole in the frame here actually. Leave the length by the bumper right here and just leave that alone. We will go back and cut off our length by the air spring. All right measure up what we want. Leave just a little bit of extra just to be on the safe side. The tubing cutter, you want to make sure the cut is as clean as possible and square otherwise the O ring inside the fitting will not work. This is actually at a little bit of an angle so you want it completely flat so that is what you do not want. We will go ahead and try it again. There we go, much flatter surface. All you have to do is basically just push this into the fitting itself and a little tug back to catch it. Get a zip tie to keep it out of the way. Now that we have got this side done we can go ahead and move over to the passenger side and install the air spring over there. 06:34
All right what we want to do is mount our hose fitting basically to the bottom of the bumper pointing down just like that. We want to go ahead and drill a hole through the bumper here and make room for that and we will finish up our lines underneath the vehicle. This is our hose from the driver side and this is our hose from the passenger side. Basically what we want to do is put a T in the middle in between the two. Just slide it into place and it kind of clicks and get it tugged back. And then our other half will go down to our valve, we just push that into there. We use some extra length hose just between these two here. Then we will run this to our hole in our bumper. Then we will put our nut on the bottom and tighten it up. Go ahead and put some air into it. All right we will go ahead and spray it down with some soapy water and look for bubbles. No bubbles, no leak. We will go ahead and let the air out and you want to leave about ten pounds of air whenever you are not using it. All right after testing our aligns and the air springs we are done for our install. There you have it for part number F2337 from Firestone. The Sport-Rite Air Spring.
