The downside to hydro shocks is that they heat up with use and fade/wear out sooner because of it. I know they have a lifetime warranty, but I just wanted to point it out.

This place always has competitive pricing on stuff.
http://www.ntwonline.com/Shock-Absorbers.html

 

Sweet that cleared some things up. So would you prefer the nitro ones over the rest? I'm mostly on road but I want to do some offroading. Not a lot to tear the truck up, just some.

 

Just playin' devils advocate here.

Most shocks (skyjacker, Rancfo, zone, etc) are pretty much made by either Monroe or Gabriel corp. While some are "custom built" most of them work pretty much the same.

As stated gas shocks provide a bit more control over rough terrain by keeping the oil cooler. But again, the brands listed all work about the same. Having either run or sold (and warranteed) most of these brands over my trucks life, I've went to Bilsteins at the insistence of a trusted compadre.

Not cheap, but I found a good deal through 3rd strike performance who matched e bay pricing. Even matched up a steering stabilizer.

Difference is night and day compared to the others. Less body roll, better ride, and no annoying "thud" when shocks are cold.

 

I run ProComp ES9000's, don't know if they are built by someone else like dsertdog was saying, but they are great shocks for what I do. They provide stable load carrying ability, and handle well on the freeway and at speed. Rough/bumpy terrain has not caused any unfavorable behavior for me either.

I had Rancho RS5000's in my Power Wagon ($50 per for shocks that extended to 36", couldn't say no to that) and for what I wanted out of that thing they worked fine as well. But they probably didn't have 3000 miles on them when I sold the truck, so they didn't see much use...

 

Yeah I heard them Bilstein shocks are pretty good but I saw that they were kinda pricey for what I was looking to spend. I think I might just go with skyjacker but the only thing I don't know is if I should get nitrogen or hydrogen ones for what I wanna do.

 

I really hope, you mean "hydraulic shocks" NOT Hydrogen shocks. It would be like riding around on 4 bombs waiting for a spark. Lol

Here's a few thoughts I found elsewhere to think about.

The weight of the vehicle has nothing to do with selecting between hydraulic and nitrogen (gas) charged shocks. In fact, it's the springs that must be properly selected to support the anticipated weight, not the shocks since the shocks themselves don't actually support the vehicle's weight. All shocks do is dampen the up-and-down motion of the springs so you don't continue bouncing after an impact, or prevent fast jolts from bottoming out or damaging suspension components.

The heaviest and lightest of vehicles use either type within the correct application (racing and high-speed needs vs. non-high speed/racing needs). Heavy duty trucks use hydraulic shocks because gas-charged shocks are, generally speaking, not designed for that type of use.

Nitrogen shocks were designed to combat and fix a problem that is unique to hydraulic shocks that are subjected to high-speed shock action that can cause foaming of the hydraulic fluid. Install a hydraulic shock on a race vehicle that has extended high-speed use and the hydraulic shock will eventually foam and fail. This is what happens if you do high speed driving (like racing or sports cars may experience) where the shocks must quickly react without causing the fluid to foam through cavitation. Nitrogen-charged shock systems cured that by eliminating the hydraulic fluid that was foaming. This is not to say a hydraulic shock has that problem on a Truck or even in a regular car. The foaming and cavitation problems I described only occurred in high-speed extended racing (like the Baja 500) applications, not exactly what Trucks are commonly involved in.

It's just a general rule-of-thumb that gas-charged shocks are designed for higher speed applications (with exceptions of course) and ride more stiffly than desireable in a Truck. Hydraulic shocks, generally speaking, don't ride as stiffly as nitrogen (gas-charged) shocks do.

 

Oops, didn't know I been putting hydrogen in place for hydraulic haha. But thanks for the written out description of them. I will consider hydraulic skyjackers then cause I'm not going fast anyway. Fastest I been was right around 100 on the interstate but it ain't bumpy on there lol.

I called auto anything just about an hour ago and they said nitrogen shocks were the better of the two. But I also read an article that nitrogen ones rode abit stiffer so I might still go with hydraulic. I'll probably get the hydro 7000 dual stabilizers too.

Around 37 bucks for a shock ain't bad I guess :P