Leaf spring

[Bob I.]

Can you bring new life to an old spring. I'm thinking of installing my main leaf from a new spring to the orginal spring.

[Gary B.]

Leaf spring

Bob,

What I suggested in one of my Restorer acticles on leaf springs is just that. Buy a new repro spring (or better yet, get Eaton-Detroit Spring to sell and ship just the main leaf, which they may or may not be willing to do) and use the new main leaf along with the other leaves from a good (no pits, no corrosion, no cracks, no obvious wear) orignal spring. That way you wind up with a spring that has the correct cosmetic ends on leaves 2-N and a new main leaf, which of course is the most critical leaf. And you get a spring that is almost certain to result in the correct ride height.

Gary

[Jack H.]

Re: Leaf spring

Yes. The degree of sucess depends on the condition of the original spring (Is it badly rusted or simply over-stressed and strained from its factory original arch?). A suspension shop profressional who does spring re-arching can ususally tell simply by visual inspection.

The process can be as simple as re-forming the original leafs of the spring, reforming them adding a heat treatment/oil quench process to strain relieve, or as complex as the aforementioned plus discarding and replacing individual leaf components that are 'history'...

[Bob I.]

Thanks

Thanks Gary and Jack -- I'll use the main leaf from my Eaton blueprinted spring and the rest of the orginal leafs which are in good shape along with a leaf spring rebuild kit from Quanta Products. When I have the car back together I'll post the results. Thanks again