Rear springs

There is a 1/2" difference in rear ride height from left to right (low on the left-driver's-side) with me out of the car, probably more when I am aboard. The springs are the uprated set supplied from some UK source about 12-13 years ago and since there is apparently no one who is re-arching springs these days I am looking to replace the current set with new.

The DW site describes the upgraded spring as having 8 leaves and mine have 9--if I count every leaf, no matter how short, as a leaf. Is it possible that when they count leaves they do not include the very short bottom one or is it possible that I have something else than is being sold by DW.

If anyone has a set of DW springs on his car and can do me the big favor of counting the number of leaves I will be greatly appreciative. I do not want to replace what I have with something of a different spec and substitute one problem for another....

Eaton Spring in Detroit will re-arch your springs. If you want to use the ones you already own, I would give them a call.

PHulst said:

Eaton Spring in Detroit will re-arch your springs. If you want to use the ones you already own, I would give them a call.

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You have to be very careful with those that say : "Rearch" Most of the time they just torch them which is unaxceptable.-Just a thought

I found an interesting article from Hagerty about re-arching springs at: https://www.hagerty.com/articles-videos/articles/2006/06/20/re-arching-leaf-springs-a-lost-art

The cost of the springs that DW sells are 129 pounds and even with shipping that is probably not more than the cost of sending mine to Detroit to have them done.

Michael, I believe the difference in "leaf" count is due to the thickness of the current spring material versus our original spring material. The original springs used a very thin leaf. The replacements use thicker material. Apparently the thin spring stock is not readily available.

Craig--

I believe the spring set I now have on the car is the upgraded 8-leaf spring set that DW sells, and I am counting part of the mount as a 9th spring. I can verify this with DW on Monday. I don't believe re-arching is the way I want to go and want to make sure I am replacing what is presently on the car with similar equipment.

Yeah, skip the re- arcing bit. Buy the new. Re arc- ing is for heavy trucks..dump trucks, tractors and the like. I've been through this with vintage stuff that you can't get new. The re-arched are nice at first but soon revert with use to what you had before. Sorta like the "limited lifetime guarantee" offered by the discount parts houses, great, except you spend the rest of YOUR limited lifetime replacing the part again and again....

Michael, wasn’t this discussed recently? Anyway: I think you are counting the bottom plate which I don't think is a leaf but have not seen your spring arrangement so only speculating. The 100/6 used a 7 leaf pack and, as you will see, I added an additional 2nd leaf to make 8. The original 7 leafs are quite thick when compared to those sold new. if I were to get new springs, I would contact Martin Jansen at Jule Enterprises for his advice. Jule developed springs for their much heavier Healey frame that I expect would never sag under an original.

My BJ8 P1 has the same suspension as earlier models with the major rear suspension change taking place with the P2. My original leaf springs began to sag on the left side exactly as you’ve describe, and my answer was to purchase a new set. However, although the new springs did initially raise the rear of the car quite high, it took less than 4 years to have them sag lower then the originals and the driver’s side left lower than the Passenger’s.

Reviewing the experiences of a number of Healey owners with Re-Ached springs (very high initially, sagging low within 2 years) and it was obvious I was not about to take this path. Although I found available new springs found at common British parts sources (as described), I saw their true lifecycle to be only marginally longer then re-arched, at a much higher price.
As the product of considerations and frustration, I decided to take my original sets of 7 heavy leaf springs and stiffen slightly by fitting an extra 2nd leaf from the failed purchased new sets. The result of this approach both improved rebound resistance, thereby eliminating bottoming onto my transverse-mounted resonator and increased height to slightly higher than appropriate for a pre-Phase 2 BJ8.

Now that I had achieved slightly more than proper height, my next step was to even that height from side-to-side. Since the effect of inserting a sim between axel mount and spring is to lower rather than raise height, any modification would need to be an indirect action. Since my driver’s side wheel opening in my Healey was 3/8” lower than the passenger side, the effect of applying a ¼” shim on the passenger side spring was to lower the passenger side by 3/16” but also resulted in raising the driver’s side 1/16”. The effect, a both sides being perceivably equal in height.

Although I have chosen to shim the passenger side to gain balance, it should not be forgotten that the modification of front suspension heights will also affect the rear suspension as well. Since this was not my selected approach, I can not comment on which side of front suspension or the extent height modification will change rear side-by-side suspensions.
Ray(64BJ8P1)

Ray

I believe you are correct that I am counting the bottom plate as a leaf and simply have the 8-leaf DW unit. That said, I will take your suggestion and contact Martin. I certainly do not want to gain level by decreasing road clearance as even though I have a bit extra because of my using 180 tires I am not about to give it up easily!

Hi Michael please email me with your phone number and I will call you.
Martin
jule_enterprisesah@yahoo.com

Martin--

Info sent.

At the suggestion of some I contacted Martin and he generously gave me several suggestions, starting with determining whether or not the issue was in my front springs--which is not the case.

Today, after first checking that my tire pressures were correct (30 psi all around is what I use on the Michelin XAS 180's) I placed a jack under the extreme left end of the rear crossmember--the one that runs under the boot--outboard of the exhaust and got some interesting measurements measuring from a level garage floor to the top of the rear wheel arch:

With jack disengaged from the crossmember: Left--26-9/16", Right--27"

Then, I began jacking under the crossmember:

Left--27", Right 27-1/4"
Left--27-1/4", Right 27-3/8"
Left--27-1/2", Right 27-9/16"
Left--27-3/4", Right 27-3/4"

So, and whether this is normal or significant, at rest there is a difference of 7/16 left to right and as I began to raise up the left side the right side ride height would change a bit as well until I had raised the left side up 1-5/16" at which point the car was level, though the rear ride height was too much for my taste and the rear wheels were noticeably low and the car had a jacked-up look.

Martin suggested that I either take both of my rear springs for re-arching or get new ones. I called one place near me in DC that does springs--apparently catering to heavy trucks--and when I told the fellow that it was for a Healey he said I should bring in both springs and he would test them for whatever he tests them for, apparently equal "springiness" and perhaps he could re-arch them. I am hesitant to do this and most comments I have seen suggest that the results will be less than permanent.

In any case I welcome any comments, thoughts, suggestions, etc on how to proceed. FWIW the car's ride is fine and I cannot see the list when I am driving but I know it is there! Again, the springs now on the car are the DW uprated ones with the extra leaf and they are about 10-12 years old with perhaps 50-60 K miles.

Is 26-9/16" from the floor to rear wheel arch too low? If not, you might try switching the springs from side to side. When you do that, see if the car is level with you out of it and in it. If the measurements show you still low on the left side, maybe your frame is somewhat twisted? If it's then low by 7/16" on the right, your frame is straight. If it's level with you in it, it will look normal when you're driving alone, and would likely return to level, although at a lower height.

If 26-9/16" is too low, I would opt for new springs vs. re-arching.

John--

No, 26-9/16" is not too low. It's that there is now a difference side-to-side when at some point there wasn't!

I have thought along the very lines you suggest--switching the springs side to side and seeing what the result is. I suppose that is the best way to determine if the problem is simply a weakened left rear spring, which should probably not be a surprise given the passage of time and miles driven. I guess the ultimate remedy would be new springs, but it might be worth doing the switch just to see if it is not something else before pulling that trigger.

I have never removed/replaced a rear leaf spring set. I recall reading that getting out one of the pins or bolts can be a real issue. What am I looking at and how is this best done?

Hi Michael,

Everything you have done matches the results I obtained when trying to solve the same problem. When I switched springs from side to side the measurement difference did not change and with the different springs in place. This made me realize that the difference was not a function of the spring but something else.

When measuring height from side to side, I measured body height from garage floor to top of wheel opening arch directly over the center of the hub/knock-off. I bring this up because this measurement reflects the positioning of the fender and includes the difference in fender adjusted installation to the body as well as the spring-imposed differences. Although this is not a major component of the overall height measurement, it should be understood as being present and could be as much as 1/8" on a reasonably straight car.

When reviewing your numbers, it was quite interesting that at some point both sides did become equal. I would interpret that to be the result of lessoning body weight across the rear and lessoning dependency on the springs. Jacking could also be pushing up on the rear and shifting downward pressure on the front springs/suspension. Keep in mind that over the years our sheet metal understructure will sag and deform under age and stress to become less then side-to-side symmetric. As a result, matching one side to the other will be an action of mismatching side-to-side to gain optical symmetry.

As I see it, an indication of supported height imposed by each rear springs can be found by measuring ground-to-spring at each spring attachment point and, although measuring wheel-arch measurements present optical symmetry, it includes too many factors to understand and determined what to change. When I did this I found that front spring mounts were within 1/16" of each other and rear mounts were equal. Based upon the fact that my body height was sufficient as a result of adding an extra leaf, this result indicated to me that spring support was not my issue but other factors were causing the optical difference.

Because the axel is mounted on top of the spring, spacers will lower rather then raise body height. Since body height was raised by stiffening the spring, adding a 1/4" wood spacer to the higher (right) side lowered that side to 1/16" of the lower (left) as measured at the fender arch. As a result, my optical symmetry was reasonably achieved. Over a year's driving the wood spacer had cracked and some change has taken place. To address this spacer deterioration, an aluminum spacer will replace the wood within the next warm days.

As mentioned, the front suspension has an affect on the rear and vis versa. Although I would like to investigate the effect of changing front suspension heights, this would complexify the problem far beyond my minimal equipment.

Last, having reached a set of rear springs and found them to be short lived and a waist of time, money, and hope. I would never recommend this activity. However, I must suggest that my disappointment could have been the product of the servicer and not the operation.

Hope this helped,
Ray(64BJ8P1)

I think Ray is right about the body possibly being off in relation to the suspension (frame) platform. We all know the body panel fit is not perfect and you can't easily replace a fender or door from another car and expect it to fit well - wheel arch could be different just like swage lines are different. So, it seems reasonable that the fenders could be the problem, or the combination of the shroud & fender. I have been working on a complete resto (lots of metal replacement and accident damage repair) of a BT7 for several years now and nothing from another car will fit without adjusting.

Michael, because of your racing, you must have corner weighing available, I would check it out and know what you have. And, as Ray said, measure the chassis platform to ground rather than body to ground.
Dave

red57 said:

I think Ray is right about the body possibly being off in relation to the suspension (frame) platform. We all know the body panel fit is not perfect and you can't easily replace a fender or door from another car and expect it to fit well - wheel arch could be different just like swage lines are different. So, it seems reasonable that the fenders could be the problem, or the combination of the shroud & fender. I have been working on a complete resto (lots of metal replacement and accident damage repair) of a BT7 for several years now and nothing from another car will fit without adjusting.

Michael, because of your racing, you must have corner weighing available, I would check it out and know what you have. And, as Ray said, measure the chassis platform to ground rather than body to ground.
Dave

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I had this happen on a '63 Vette that I put a rear suspension in last year. the right side fender arch was almost 1/2" higher than the left side.

Michael, about changing the left springs. It's not THAT big of a deal. You just must take some precautions that are different than most cars. Because the chasis is underslung, with the axle above the frame rails, when the spring is bolted to the axle tube it will pull the axle down against the top of the frame rail. The normal arch of the spring will pull the axle down hard against the frame so you don't want to just unbolt the spring u-bolts. Doing so would literally make the spring "POP" away from the axle. Very dangerous. And on the reverse assembly it would be very difficult to pull the spring and bottom plate up to the axle. So what needs to be done is to have a way to clamp the axle to the frame as well as pull the spring up to the axle with another clamp. You can use large "C" clamps. There is an alternative but first I want to note that to lower the spring and then raise it again you must be able to do that with access to the bolts. I just used a wooden block about 4 inches long and 1 inch square to ride across the spring plate laterally where- by I could still get a socket on the nuts of the U-bolts.
My alternative approach to releasing the spring from the axle as well as rejoining it is to use a telescopic bottle jack under the spring plate pushing against the wood block. But two things will happen before the spring is pushed up far enough to get the nuts on the u-bolts. One is the axle will try to raise, so I pinned the axle in place with a wooden block between the axle and the top of the wheel arch where the bump stop is. I did this on both sides so that the axle would stay put. then the next thing that happens when you raise the bottle jack is that the whole car will go up. Obviously this is no good either. So I took the rear seat out of the car and used a long 2 x 4 board to pin the car down by putting the 2 x 4 between the rear seat bulkhead and the ceiling of my shop. this then kept the axle and the car from moving anywhere and you can just jack the spring with its plate up to the axle and spin on the nuts. Assuming that you used the previously mentioned wooden block to span the plate so you could get a socket on the u-bolts.

Dave/Ray--

I have already checked the chassis for levelness and it is level. The sag is in the rear left and as I understand and realize it is not unreasonable for that to be so given the number of years and miles since I installed these springs.

I do have access to scales and plan to corner-weigh the car before doing anything to the springs. I probably will not get to this for several weeks and will keep posting to this topic as work progresses.

Thanks all.

Too bad I didn't get to meet up with you this weekend (on a brighter note, the cat seems to have perked up a bit, and has a healthy appetite__but at 20 yrs old...). Anyway, I could've gone over the task of replacing the springs.

When these cars were new/daily drivers and then neglected used cars, getting the front bolt out could be, but wasn't always, terrible! I expect yours done not so long ago won't be too hard to remove (I ALWAYS use Kopr-Shield on these, and bolts in a similar use upon reassembly, figuring that I'll be the next guy).

One (1) thing that comes in handy, at least for the 6-cylinder tail-draggers, is the use of an 8" C-clamp to close the gap between the spring and axle, until the u-bolts can have the nuts started on them. Even if they reach, using the C-clamp will save a lot of stress on those fine threads.

Grease the bolts/shackles as it goes back together, and you might even get through the whole job without cursing at all.