ADS Triple Bypass Rears - Revalve?

I know this isn't a LT question, but y'all actually know what the hell you're talking about so I figured I can dive deeper into my "issue" here.

Setup:
Total Chaos UCA
2.5 ADS Coilovers w/ adjusters
Coachbuilder shim for the fronts to help clear 37's without cranking the preload (probably going to pull the shock and drop the preload 1/2"-1". - Measures 13/16" thread showing passenger side and ~1" driver side).

2.5 ADS Triple bypass (valved for U748)
Still on stock leaf (yes I know).
Coachbuilder +3 shackle
ADS Air bumps 2" stroke

So my rears feel super stiff when I hit bigger bumps/dips/potholes. Not just subjectively stiff, but the rear end will kick out to the side and it feels like a g out. I think I have a firm enough grasp on how to properly start turning tubes, but I wanted to ask not having the Deaver leafs makes THAT big of a difference? My fronts feel great, but something just doesn't seem right with the rear and the truck feels really unbalanced front to back. Do y'all think that tuning the bypass tubes would be enough or do you think revalving would be necessary?

Side note... I'm not looking to purchase the deavers at this point since I've decided to commit to a LT setup and it'd be stupid to buy 2 sets of deavers.

Thoughts and suggestions?

 

Awesome setup first off. Yea having deavers would make a huge difference since those shocks are valved specific to that spring. I would revalve the shock then tune from there. That would be the best way. Either have ADS revalve or accutune do it. That should be night and day difference from what you’re feeling now. What LT kit are you doing? You going full spring under also? And tire pressure comes into play

 

Daddy chill, I think you're making adjusting bypasses out to be a way bigger deal than it is. All you need is a socket and an open end and just start screwing with things. The beauty is nothing is permanent! You might already have a good valve setup and don't even know it without dialing in the tubes, and then you rebuild the shocks and might have moved further away from what you wanted. Just go and open all the tubes up to full flow (back the set screw all the way out) and see how that feels and then go the opposite direction and choke the tubes (set a screw all the way in), and if neither of them made any difference then rebuild the shock.

Also what is your bump pressure at and are you hitting them and how much bump travel are you using? Going out on a limb I bet the stock springs have a higher rate than the deavers, so I would open up the tubes all the way to try and remove the shock from the equation more. Getting it properly tuned is obviously best, but for how easy it is to quickly see if you're in the ballpark I think it's worth the effort.

 

Not sure about the “Daddy” comment in the post above, but the rest is ok. Something else to maybe consider is the difference in thickness of leaf spring packs changes when the bump is engaged. Not sure if the difference between the U748 spec shock and non is tuning or something more.

 

Honestly it's the leafs, the stock leaf pack with overloads doesn't flex a ton. As a stopgap, pick up a Deaver/Wheelers/Icon mini pack for a couple hundred bucks and try that. Poor man's Deavers...

 

is that the MCM setup as far as valving ? best would be to talk to him.
I run the same bypasses with the Deaver pack and it's really good. Easy to adjust as mentioned by @snivilous . Love that setup.

if used with Deaver, TC shackles are recommended as well for a 3/4 to 1" lift.

 

I think I'll probably just do the dirt king f/r and run SUA. As much as I want to go LSK it doesn't make sense because I just don't have access to areas where I'd be able to even use stuff like that enough to justify the cost. Plus I still do a decent amount of crawling so it doesn't make sense for me to get links.

 

First set and first truck I'm really "building" in this direction so I'm partially overthinking it, but definitely not scared to try some tuning...just hard to find a place to tune around here since TX is all privately owned land. That was good that you said something cause I was about to take the compression adjuster knob approach and go back softer rather than going full open and working it back to compliant. Total noob but definitely willing to learn and adjust.

The bump pressure is a big culprit! I checked that this morning before I read this and they're at 40-driver 45-passenger which makes no sense. Definitely need to get that addressed cause I'm just slamming the suspension at this point.

Really appreciate the feedback!

 

Yeah the Deaver is a considerable difference and the bump pressures were set so low/never set so I was bottoming out pretty hard and I think that's a culprit of what I was feeling in the rear end.

 

It's some shit I literally just gave an Icon pack to a buddy because I was going deaver, but changed my mind again haha.

 

It basically is since it's valved for the U748, but I ordered through a good buddy of mine who became a dealer. Relative lift height is about the same with the coach builder shackle on the stock leaf, but obviously the spring rate is way different. Maybe I'm just too ambitious for a mid travel setup too haha.

 

That’s why I mentioned it, the side kick is the telltale. Not to contradict previous advice, but don’t open all the tubes up. One at a time, start with rebound. This allows you to feel the difference vs. how it is now.

 

Really appreciate the feedback! I mean it wouldn't hurt as long as I'm counting turns to wide open so I have a reference point from where it came out of the box. Worst case scenario I completely botch the tuning and I can reset it and try again. Just one of those hard headed guys who likes to learn the why/how by doing than reading.

 

Few notes here: opening the tube (unthreading the set screw) allows more flow = softer. The more threaded in the set screw is, the less the check valve can open, thus the less bypass flow there is, thus the "stiffer" the shock is because there is more flow through the piston itself.

In regards to the bumps, you certainly could be blowing through them but I've known guys that ran just low enough pressure in the bump so that it would extend and nothing more. The bump is a shock itself and while pressure obviously plays a huge role, it has it's own internal valving so it's not useless even at low pressures. I had a suspension before that was really close to the bump stops at ride height and ran really low pressure to make them not clank constantly. This isn't to say yours don't have enough pressure (if you're using all their travel routinely obviously you don't), but don't think that a lot of pressure is mandatory for the bump to function.

And I agree with Vizsla, obviously a more scientific approach of adjust one tube at a time is the best. I was just saying if you want to take the 5 minute approach and see if you can make your suspension handle drastically differently and conclude that the tubes adjustment range does encompass what you want, then just full open or closed on everything and hitting a speedbump would tell you really fast!

One final note, which is obvious but sometimes people forget (I certainly did when I first got bypasses): the tubes are bypassing flow around the piston, so the piston has less fluid resistance in the range of that tube. That means the maximum damping/stiffness the shock can have is whatever the valving in the piston is. If you screw in all the adjusters and effectively turn off the bypasses, it's just a normal shock with the valving of the piston. The bypasses make sections of the shock softer, not stiffer. You might make a section more or less soft relatively, but you're always reducing pressure in front of the piston. This is why all bypasses have a "bump zone", that's really just the zone where the piston has left the last bypass section and is now running at it's true valving. It's also easy to look at a bypass and figure out which direction the flow is, because the check valve is just a spring loaded plunger so can't let flow in from the tube at 90deg to the adjuster, it needs fluid coming up the long tube and that fluid needs to hit enough pressure to overcome the preload in the plunger and then the plunger moves and that amount of motion is controlled by the set screw position. I don't know how your bypasses are set up, but there's lots of different configurations with all of that in mind. You can have bypass tubes that are staggered or overlapping. If you have two tubes that partially overlap, then in that overlap area you have two levels of bypassing occurring at the same time which is needed if you need the shock to get really soft and one tube can't flow enough. That also adds a little complexity versus a staggered tube setup, since with the staggered setup that tube adjusts only that section.

Just some things to think about.

 

This is exactly why I posted in here vs the other suspension forum. Yeah definitely need to do some adjustments and I'll probably get the bumps charged up to get that situated since I'm really hurting the setup on the stock leaf. Then just work in adjustments slowly. Really appreciate the help!

 

I don’t know if you’ve already covered this someplace, but while you’re testing, make sure you have a small section of road or trail that you can run multiple times back to back repeatedly. Don’t just go for a five mile drive. It’ll be even better if it’s a section you’re already familiar with. Doesn’t have to be off road to start with. I’ve run back and forth behind a grocery store with several speed bumps just to get a basic tune done.

One tube at a time.
Count and document your turns.
have fun!

 

It’s 100+ consistently here in Texas. Not prioritizing it until we go back out haha. I was going to charge the bumps up first and there’s a road that has a bunch of potholes where I discovered the “problem” haha