63 front coil spring

[Rainer S.]

I removed what looked like the original front coil springs from my 63 SWC. the springs have 6 coils, overall length is 15.25" and the wire dia is .550". The new springs from Paragon have 6 coils, O.A.L. is 13.25 " and the wire size is .660".
Can anybody tell me, which is correct ?

[Duke W.]

Re: 63 front coil spring

If you contacted GM Customer Service and received your complimentary "restoration package", which includes a set of AMA specifications you will find that the OEM front spring is fabricated from a piece of 0.552" diameter wire that is 96.928" inches long. Nothing like five signficant digits when it comes to precision!!! The ID of the spring is 3.80" and the compressed height should be 8.56" with the car at gross weight, which is a spring load of 1340 pounds.

Why do you want to replace the original springs?

For the many other spring questions, the AMA specification for your model year should have sufficient dimensional information to allow you to verify that your springs are OEM and determine if "reproduction" springs are correct, which many appear not to be.

Duke

[Franz E.]

[Rainer S.]

Re: 63 front coil spring

Duke, the reason I am replacing the orig. springs, is, when I started to restore the car, I found a spring extender wedged in both springs. This indicated to me, that the springs had sagged. (I never drove the car) I assumed, I needed new springs. I will check the dimensions as per specs and decide, if I really need to replace the old springs. I dont think, the springs from Paragon are correct. I will contact them. Thanks for the advise.

[Mike Sasser]

Re: 63 front coil spring

I bought some original front springs for my small block 65 from Dr Rebuild, you might want to see if they have them for your 63

[Joe L.]

Re: 63 front coil spring

Rainer and Mike----

The GM #3832684 spring originally used on 1963 and early 1964 Corvettes was discontinued in June, 1982 so I doubt that there are many of these still around. The late 64 through 1967 small block front spring, GM #3851100 was discontinued in November, 2000 so there is much more liklihood that Dr. Rebuild might have one of these. The 3851100 can be used to replace the 3832684 if both springs are replaced at the same time.

By the way, the 3832685 originally used a purple tag; the 3851100 tag is green.

Also, the spring expanders may have been installed by some previous owner for the purpose of "raising" the front end, but not necessarily because it "sagged". It could have been done because the owner wanted to use somewhat larger than stock tires or, simply, because the owner wanted a higher-than-stock front ride height. That was popular in the 60s and 70s.

[Rainer S.]

Re: 63 front coil spring

Joe-
I think you are correct with the assumption, that the person, who installed the expanders wanted to raise the car for bigger tire, since I found evidence, that the bigger tires had rubbed on the inside lip of the fenders, both front and rear. If iI cant find any good orig. springs, i will re-install my old ones and see...Thanks, everybody, for your advise.

[Joe L.]

Re: 63 front coil spring

Rainer----

If the spring's free length is close to the dimension that Franz supplied, I wouldn't even worry about looking for replacements.