Leaf springs

dotcentral · Post by **dotcentral** » July 2, 2007, 7:38 am

Last week a leaf spring that went flat. No arch, just completely straight.

I had a spare set that were from a newer F100 using the flex-o-matic shackle, the springs themselves look brand new. A buddy with an air compressor and impact tools said bring it over. Turns out Slicks weren't designed for these springs. The bumpsides have a built-in notch in the rear bed crossmember to let the longer assembly fit under the bed. We had to cut slots and pound flat the cross member to get that space. The spring mounts weren't an exact match, but after a lot of playing around finally got it all to mount up.

Truck rides nice now. Was pretty much an all day job. If I had to do it again I would have called around and got a standard set of used springs.

Johnny Canuck · Post by **Johnny Canuck** » July 2, 2007, 11:25 am

what were you hauling made the spring go flat? I have an 80 year old model T that the springs are fine on... do they just go flat on newer vehicles or did you have a ton of bricks in it?

:cry:

dotcentral · Post by **dotcentral** » July 2, 2007, 11:48 am

It had the original type 5000 GVR springs with the helper spring on the bottom of the stack. I hadn't hauled more than a couple hundred pounds in it 4-5 times. I did have the front end on jack stands for about 3 months while slowly doing the diec brake swap, so guess it may have had a bit of a load from that? Didn't notice anything broken in the bad spring set. When we toke the spring out, it went back to being arched, so guess it lost its temper or whatever you call it.

The truck had sat without being moved for a number of years before I got it. I was about the 4th person to get it after it had sat like that, no telling what was loaded in the bed while it just sat.

cdherman · Post by **cdherman** » July 2, 2007, 8:33 pm

Are you sure the shackles were not bound up, as in jambed. A set of springs that doesn't have much life, coupled with shackles that are rusted tight and binding may just stay down.

Did you try driving over a railroad track at 30 mph. That's the short term cure to knock them loose.

Long term, probably new springs were needed anyhow.....

dotcentral · Post by **dotcentral** » July 3, 2007, 8:31 am

Didn't drive it fast over tracks, but the shackle moved freely and when giving it the shock absorber bounce test the old leaf had movement in it still.