Too much emphasis on suspension????

Keep it simple
I have just leaf springs (no shocks) on my camper trailer and found them to be find on our trip around Aus. And we did all the mayjor tracks and gave the trailer death, as i am a ruff ar*e:) . We dragged it at 110kph over corrigations with no problems and off roaded it will no problems at all. We also think i over loaded the trailer too with all our crap but that did not seem to matter to it performance. I am a coil person and was a bit worried at first with having a trailer with Cart springs but they were fine. And my trailer does not even have shocks. But nothing got damaged or brocken in the trailer on the trip. Even the TV.
The company i bought the trailer off and a later article in 4wd said that the set up i have is alot better in the feild as little to go wrong, and easy to fix if it does
To sum up i will not be going out and up grading the surtpension to some fancy stuff, moto is keep it simple stupid

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Originally Posted by Buggerluggs

Splitting hairs, but it was designed in '79 and released in '80. I know because I did the original design. The last job I did for Henry.

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The sedan may have had coil suspension since then but the wagons and utes which are more for load carrying than the sedan still have rear leaf suspension in the current model.

I just recently bought a camper trailer with leaf springs and no shocks. I was a little concerned when I towed it home from the factory as it bounced around a lot. However when I loaded it up for its first trip it towed beautifully. No bouncing at all. I might put shocks on it one day but if I did I would take it to a trailer suspension place and get them to tell me my options first considering how little I know about trailer suspension design. The springs that are on it now I think are designed for use without shocks. They have those weird things strapped to the top of the spring packs. Two for each spring with one mounted in front of the axle and one behind on each spring. So not sure how just adding shocks to these springs would go.

I spoke to a trailer builder a while ago about this very subject and I put him back in his place when he started going on about axel ground clearance and crap like that.

I just told him that if the tow vehicle will make it through, granted the trailer has the same sized tire package as you should in that situation and wheel track is similar then the trailer axel will have clearance and that wouldn't even be a consideration.

This was at a camping show and he was trying to sell his suspention on that grounds only really.

The main thing is matching load, stopping suspention hop with shocks and reliability.

There is no real substitute for leaves and coils, rubber or what not is more something just as a sales pitch than a nessesity.

I towed caravans commercially for a couple of years and the only suspention failiers I ever had was 1 U bolt that I noticed while stopped at a truck stop and a broken stub axel on a rubberised viscount that was not meant to be towed where the hirer towed it.

Brakes and stuff like that fail all the time on trailers but the old simple leaf springs are the most efficient and cost effective way of keeping a trailer off the ground.

I built my trailer over 17 years ago and have skull dragged it every where my Series IIA could take it, the rangie and now in my Disco. She has HG Holden Monaro leaf springs of christ only knows load capacity (got them off a rooled car and nice and long) bounces a bit empty but with a bit of weight in it rides beautifully.

i would love to be able to justify buying one with coils and all the fruit but my old trailer is still in exellent nick so she stays.

Blythe

P.S. To true about the unsprung weight

WOW.... what a thread!
One of my clients actually builds the trailers for a fairly big ff road camper mob and he hs been telling me that all the hype around indpendent coils is just money for jam to him. He can build a leaf susp with shocks for less than half an Alko and he has laid $10,000 on the table if I can break his suspension!!!!
The point of a 75mm tube axle is well founded according to my mate, just he reckons everyone asks for a solid axle so thats what they get.
I've been researching all this for about a year now and reckon I've heard/read it all but this thread has been fantastic!!!!

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We dragged it at 110kph over corrigations with no problems

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:eek: :eek: That is way too quick for me with a trailer! What was the rush?

Just to add to the flaming, i have never seen an XD falcon with coils in the rear and that goes for sedan/wagon/pvan/ute. I'm 99 % sure it was the XE that had coils.

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Originally Posted by noddy

:eek: :eek: That is way too quick for me with a trailer! What was the rush?

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Nah no rush just the 90 loved to sit at that speed and floated across the top of them and made the ride so much more pleaseant

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Originally Posted by loanrangie

Just to add to the flaming, i have never seen an XD falcon with coils in the rear and that goes for sedan/wagon/pvan/ute. I'm 99 % sure it was the XE that had coils.

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I am with you on that.

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Just to add to the flaming, i have never seen an XD falcon with coils in the rear and that goes for sedan/wagon/pvan/ute. I'm 99 % sure it was the XE that had coils.

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Not too sure about the model, but it was definately released in 1980/81. (Age affects the brain...so does the alchohol!) I used to work for Ford in the Advanced Engineering group and the coil sprung rear was the back off as the original was an independent suspension but the Granada diff would not take the torque of the 5.7 V8. We designed and built a hell of a lot of specials during those days.

Some more food for thought. Springs are designed based on some simple stress/strain criteria, but the manufacturing method has a dramatic impact on their durability. Leaf springs are very simply a flat bar in simple bending (not, but will do for the argument). At the surface of each leaf under certain conditions the stresses reach their maximum, this is the determinant of the spring strength and durability (assuming suitable steel selection...steels aint steels!). As part of the manufacture the leaf is heated to very high temperatures. During this process as it is exposed to air and you get what is called decarburisation. In effect the carbon contained in the steel in leached out into the surrounding air. As a result the effective strength of the steel at the surface is reduced. This is usually catered for in the design of the spring. However as you reheat a leaf as in the case of getting a spring reset, you take more carbon out of the steel. End result you reduce its surface strength and it will eventually fail, sooner rather than later. The same principle ocurs in coil springs. I have seen springs reset by a spring maker several times and then had it tested for fatigue only to see it fail well short of its design life, just because it was exposed to air while above a certain temperature for too long during its manufacture. Why is this important? Anyone with a simple forge and furnace can make a spring, but not everyone can make one to last the distance we put them through. The moral being 'go to a reputable spring maker, preferably one who makes springs for the motor industry and get quality product'. And another is NEVER get a spring reset (especially a coil spring), you could reduce its life quite significantly.