SLOW settling suspension

[Ck2hans]

All four corners of the coach SLOWLY loose air over about a 2 week time frame when the coach is stored and I come home to find it bottomed out. What would be the most likely place to start looking for leaks considering the coach IS NOT leaning, but all four corners are going down equally over approx 2 week time frame.

Chuck

[Joe Camper]

Its leaning, all 3 ways. U r in FL weather, it should stand there for months. There's 3 corners not 4

Start by going over any suspension fittings easily accessible with soap then the ones that aren't easily accessible next.

All 3 corners on your bus ARE leaking, equally That's not 1 leak its 3, and potentially more than 1 leak at each corner as well.

[Ck2hans]

Thanks Joe:
Sounds like this is going to be more fun than I planned. You going to be in central FL anytime soon?
Chuck

[Joe Camper]

Winter vacation started today once again my body is united with my soul. I am points south of Taverneer.

I will come back north if u want me to. Short notice here but I have to be in Cocoa on Thursday. Could take another trip north at some other point this season. I'll be in Naples for a week in Jan too. I would like to limit things for Dec jan and Feb to no more than 7 or 8 days of work per month max and I'm just about there.

An entire set of bags and spool valves aren't 2500 bucks from prevo fittings r another few hundred depending on what's in place. Dont take long when I dont make mistakes.

Then theirs another approach the let's just see what's going on first method. Worked good for Gill. Found and removed 4 leaky fittings and sealed up his L and R rear.

All 4 leaks on his were on the air tanks for the rear drive bags. they r the only 2 that r mounted inboard. We pulled all the drains on all 6 rear bag tanks and plugged them while we were at it. His components were and remain all original and still showing very slight signs of wear. It's been in a good environment. Although common this is not always the case the scenarios run the entire gammit. There r chassis out there that r half the age with twice the wear. I pulled 10yr old air bags out of buses that look brand new. In Virginia I pulled a 10 yr old bag out that was rusted through the base leaking there.

[Ck2hans]

Slow leans UPDATE:

Well, due to Covid 19 and many days at home I have spent numerous hours under the bus. Found a fare share of small leaks and fixed them. Have my air loss down to approximately 1 to 1.5 PSI per hour (pretty proud of myself). I can not find any more visible leaks and still have the slow leans to the rear passengers side (takes about a day and half to start leaning). The hole bus will eventually settle after about a week and a half, but rear passengers starts down first. If I keep the aux compressor running and keep the PSI up the bus does not settle at all.
Been through every fitting inside and out and all Norgren's, no visible leaks. Did find air was leaking internally through the air horn solenoid (that was a hard one to find), replaced it. Knowing it is the passengers rear settling first what specific things should I be concentrating on considering I have been through everything multiple times?
Have made all the air leak checks with key in off position, would having the key in the on position make any difference in the trouble shooting? Leans occur with the key off so that's why I did the trouble shooting with the key off.

Chuck

[Joe Camper]

Im afraid U have upset Pierre. That's bad.

There's one thing that you said there that you put in caps the bus does not lean with the auxiliary compressor on. Although I believe that you believe that has some effect on it it really can't unless you have the HWH leveling system on it MAYBE. With emphasis on MAYBE because I still think not and I dont mess with hwh and dont know.

Another thing I'm not sure that you realize it doesn't matter if your brake tanks on the dash go down to absolutely nothing that has absolutely nothing to do with that suspension is going to hold or not sounds like you got a big leak on the one corner and the rest of the stuff is going down quicker than it really should ought to. Did you soap up around the top of the airbag where the metal lid is crimped around the rubber?

If you have the brake tanks down to losing only a pound and a half an hour you should be very satisfied with that that's very very good all of you out there with buses that hold air pressure indefinitely you don't even know how lucky you are and enjoy it while it's happening cuz that could change in the wink of an eye and probably often does.

When people ask me to chase that stuff they get the disclaimer the bus has to cooperate and what I always suggest is how many hours do you want a budget for me to go through it and then after that amount of time is up we see how good or how poorly it cooperated and we can decide if it's good enough or we want to go further or stop there. Suspension air, that's different, we either seal it up tight or we know where it's going. Brake tank air needs a cooperative patient. Perfection is elusive.

Did you open up the driver's door on the H and stick that sniffer in that cavity where the bottom side of the emergency brake button and the air toggle for the tag Lyft is? Sniff around inside the bus right around the yellow button where you push down on it. Wiggle it while you're listening that a common intermittent leak.

[Joe Camper]

I have found it good practice anytime I see a new patient the first thing out of my tools and my trailer is the 20 lb sledge hammer and I put it right there at the front of the bus at the garage door right where she can see it.

[Ck2hans]

Joe:
Aux tank always goes down way before the primary/secondary brake tanks.
Have spent a lot of time in the front drivers compartment, had a half dozen leaks in there.
Haven't checked the parking brake under the yellow push button, not sure how to access it. It's way up there from the drivers front access area.
Did the best I could to spray soap around the air bags, limited access with the wheels on. Didn't see any leaks, but again really didn't get good soap coverage completely around the bags.
Is there a specific area or thing I should be concentrating on that pertains to the passengers rear bags?
Started out saying to myself I was not going to let this rear passengers side leak get the best of me, but man have I put some hours into trying to find it and still no success.

Chuck

P.S. I do have the HWH leveling system but rarely use it.

[Joe Camper]

Open up the driver's door from the outside looking in you could see under the ledge where your left forearm rests while you're driving where all those controls are where the button is. Door open look rear you can look in there from the ground and you can stick a sniffer in there looking towards the back of the bus with that door open you can see the bottom of those two valves in the push in fittings but make sure you check it inside the bus too right at the yellow button and wiggle it while you're checking it. In the rear concentrate on the tag axle air bags and go all the way around the top of the airbags were there crimped with straight Dawn dish soap painted on there with an artist's brush and let it sit for 3 or 4 hours and go back and look. The year your chassis the auxiliary air has no bearing on the suspension either although it is kind of aggravating if you're losing it that's often the hardest system to keep tight. If you have an auxiliary gauge and you haven't opened your dash and checked the push in fittings coming right out of the back of the gauges on the dash check there too.