I'm certainly not saying the air shocks are perfect. Shoot we've listed a number of problems with them in the earlier posts. And I will not have them on any of my future cars, but they have their place in the world. For a 17 year old high school kid with a beat up old California Special, very little cash, and a friend with a 18' ski boat, they were the perfect solution. Hoop up the boat, add some air, some ice, and some, refreshments and we were set for the weekend. A yellow and white ski boat hooked up to a Highland Green GT/CS is a pretty picture. But I digress......
And, yet I had problems with them just like everyone else has problems with them. The first day out I lost air (tail pipe) and sliced both brand new tires. An hour rolling the inner edges of the wheel arches took cars of any future air losses, but of course that was like closing the barn door after horse got out because I never lost air again for the next 10 years.
Ouch, the horse analogy brings up a painful memory. My old GT/CS and I had a close encounter of the big brown horse kind once. Dark road, dark brown horse, weak old Mustang headlights. The horse was smack dab in the center of the road. Swerved left but not quite far enough. Broke the windshield, tore off the drivers side mirror and the scoop, and wrinkled the whole left side of the car. The horse just walked away.
Found the horse and the horse's owner the next day. The horse's owner just built a new fence the day before and he couldn't figure out how the horse broke through it so easily. He nailed the horizontal boards to the OUTSIDE of the posts instead of the inside.