Thread: Suspension springs

Originally Posted by gromit

Leaf spring spreaders used to be common so that you could grease/oil them. I've also seen wedges that had a hole in them so you drove them between the leaves & injected grease.
Model T Ford Forum: ACCESSORY OF THE DAY 01/24/10 KNOWLSON LEAF SPRING SPREADER TOOLS

There is some debate as to whether the grease or oil attracts dirt and causes additional wear.

On 'high end' cars you used to see gaiters on the leaf springs, kept dirt out & grease in Welcome to Wefco Gaiters I dread to think what they cost now but surprised to see Wefco still in business.



Colin

My 1949 P3 Rover had gaiterson the rear springs, when I memoved them to wash , inspect & grease them they were like new no sign of were or rust. The origional gaiters were made of leaver that had gone hard so my wife made me some out of black vinal.

Originally Posted by cjc_td5

Has anyone used Teflon spring pads (or better still, Teflon strips) on series springs? Would involve drilling a hole near the end of the leaves to locate the pads.

There is a US site called Expedition Landrovers, lots of interesting information, including using stick on teflon tape between the springs. Only thing is that it would add some thickness to the springs and might need some change to the U-bolts and will also need some changes to the shocks since the standard shocks rely on the friction between the springs to provide some shock absorption. This is the same if you put parabolics on, no interspring friction therefore different shock required. I looked at the tape a few years ago but it was very expensive so I ended up chamfering the ends of the leaves and diamond cutting them to make them work a little better.

Cheers,

TimJ.