You always hear that shocks are most efficient when they're straight up and down. Why the heck are shocks on trucks slanted and even staggered?

I think the staggered rear shocks (driver side in back of the axle, passenger side in front of the axle) is to help control torque twist of the axle housing. Not sure why they aren't vertical.

oh ok, thanks

Waaaay too much travel if they are vertical.

Why would it be any more than normal? The shocks don't hold the weight of limit the travel, the springs do

Shocks on a 45 degree travel half as far as the axle. If you have 10" of axle travel from the bumpstop to full extended, vertical shocks would have to be too long to cover 10" of travel.Just my thoughts, I'm not a designer.

Good point, but if it really rode better wouldn't it be worth it?

And if you think about it a shock on a 45* would be longer than a shock straight up and down

Say the axle is 10" from the top shock mount. So a 10" shock would work vertically. To mount the shock at 45* you would have to move the top shock mount 10" back (or forward) but the shock length would grow to just over 14". So you would have a longer shock that travels less. That doesn't make sense to me. Maybe that's why they say it's more "efficient" to mount them straight up and down

Right?

no....

think "static" ride height... 5" up, and 5" down travel (just for conversation sake these are just examples of theoretical lengths, not accurate lengths). Vertically mounted shocks would need a full 5" of up travel, and full 5" of down travel, resulting in a 15-16" long shock. a 45* mounted shock would only need 2.5-3" up travel, and 2.5-3" down travel... result is around a 8-9" long shock overall. It is much easier to accommodate a 10" long shock, than a 16" long shock when trying to engineer a specific ride height into a vehicle... TRUE, the more shock travel you can get, the better in theory it will ride.. but today's shock technologies allow for specific valving by vehicle/weight/travel length to overcome this decrease in shock travel. (stiffer shocks)

i think what you are trying to re-engineer the "chicken" (existing truck), and not thinking about the "egg" (concept truck).

Ford F150s, have "outboard" (outside the frame rails) shocks. They did this to increase their length, and to move the "control" point as close to the wheel as possible, for greater control (efficiency). The shocks are more "vertical" than most truck shocks, because there is additional room vertical to work with... yet they are still not totally vertical. There just isnt enough room to mount it totally vertical due to intended ride height versus intended suspension travel rates.

A vertical shock will travel more and be shorter in length, whereas a shock on a 45* angle will travel less but be longer in overall length.

It makes sense to me that a shock that trevels further will absorb the impacts better resulting in a more comfortable ride.

Think of the 45* shock as being the hypotenuse of a right triangle. The vertical shock will always be shorter than a hypotenuse 45* shock. Here is a drawing I just did in class to show you what I'm saying.

I'm not the best artist but this should show my point that a 45* shock (or any degree other than 90) will be longer in length but travel less.

The drawing on the top left is a hypothetical shock shown at ride hieght.

So my understanding of efficiency is a shock doing more work and being shortest in length would be the most "efficient."

Now, if they're staggered to control front to back movement of the axle, then that is another story.

quote:

Now, if they're staggered to control front to back movement of the axle, then that is another story.

there shouldnt be any front and back movement.. only a twisting action (axle wrap).

I think you got it now... but i'll just say it in a different way to make sure.

if you have 12" of wheel travel (6" up, 6" down), and there is only 8" between the axle, and the bottom of the bed, there is no way to fit a short enough shock in there to accommodate that length of needed travel, unless you lean it at a 45-60* angle. (increasing the shock length). I can only assume the engineers of these trucks took all this into consideration... designing the least angle vs shock length needed to maximize ride quality and suspension travel.

I see what you're saying. All I know is our trucks ride like crap compared to any other truck I've ever driven. But that's not why we bought a hemi is it...