Originally Posted by
Lizardracing
A couple of things and ideas I've been playing around with. AFCO has a Youtube video posted that compressed air could be used long enough to get ya home again to a proper repair. First is the volume of air in a gas shock, It's quite small even if a canister style is used. I don't have a canister available to me to measure but my own non canister style shock is less than 2sq inches of volume. Since the water content is also very small, I would think it would have to take a fairly large water vapor content to have corrosion or fading issues due to water present. That said, I would think a quality compressor dryer would do the job, the style used in auto body paint sprayers for example. That still leaves the fact that many standard shop air compressors can't make the upwards of 300psi needed to fill a shock though. Especially, but not limited too, the lines/hose are long and pressure tends to be lessened at 50 foot or more of hose through 1/4 fittings. Second, N2 is cheap and can be had about any welding supply house. Most guys already have a welding tank and buying a $350 set up (tank/fill/regulator hose and manifold) for shocks doesn't make much dollar sense on top of the typical lower budget $200/each gas shock on the market.Chemistry says N2 and Argon are both inert gasses and SHOULD act close to the same as long as they are pure. Most MIG welding uses Argon/CO2, The C02 is the variable here.Tank pressures are about the same, around 2-3000psi. Third, I built my own manifold for shocks using a Schrader valve, a 0-300 pressure gauge and No loss chuck. A length of 1' T6 aluminum dowel, gun drilled and tapped for 1/8 NPT on both ends and 1/4 NPT for $50. That beats the $130ish for the one in popular motorsports and aftermarket shock catalogues prices. I took me an hour from start to finish. If a person doesn't have a lathe or mill, then a simple brass tee fitting gets the job done. Fourth, Using my new manifold I filled the RF shock on my car and asked my shock guy to run it "hard" on the shock dyno to "test it out" and I used that as a base line. I then took the shock home, filled it with Argon and took it back the next day and asked him to test it again in the same mannor. I got some weird looks but he's a good guy so he did it anyway. Once again I took it back home and filled it with compressor air without a dryer at all. All three times tested were at 50psi, the recommended pressure for the RF tie down shock. After the test on the 3rd time I told what I was up to and I didn't want his knowledge to skew results. In this blind test of the sorts, all three dyno graphs were identical or well beyond the scope of the graduations of the dyno it self and we both agreed any variances are beyond the tolerance of the shock dyno he uses. Without my own shock dyno, I wasn't able to do any further testing but it seems, the dry air, N2 or Argon will work well enough for a dirt car for the average weekend warrior or for any one in a pinch trying to get to the track. If I were chasing regional or national points I'd still go with N2, for everyone else like me brewing up junk in there home shop, I'd 100 percent say Argon or Argon/C02 gets the job done and if you build your own manifold from parts on Amazon, one can save a bunch of money and spend it on things like tires and fuel and seat time.Finally, in some other of my interests beyond CT racing, I found some off road guys and some Motorcross guys using gas shocks have also been using Argon for a long time as a alternative so apparently it's not a new idea at all but seems novel in the CT roundy round crowds. Not tested would be the effects of pressure and valving and long term excessive heat build up like you might get a long rough track. IT would be interesting to see those results if I had the ability to do that sorta level of reasearch.
