I just did a swap on my 1500 this past weekend to a
fixed spring. I just bought a new transverse leaf
spring about 4 years ago and it had just started to
sag.
I was told by the shop back then "You don't need it.
They're supposed to lean". Uh yeah...Well change it
anyhow.
As far as a car's rear weight, I back-dated my rear
bumpers early on, removed the rear extensions, the
spare tire and all of the tools, and have a fiberglass
trunk lid ALL to make the rear end lighter, and I
still got the sag after only 4 years (and 50k miles?).
Regardless, with the car jacked-up in the air, the
swing springs bolt right on to the car without
levering. In fact, when I unbolted it from the
verticals, the spring actually LIFTED (Remember this
is supposed to be putting downward pressure ontop of
the hubs lifting up the car's ass).
The "new" early fixed spring I installed this weekend
was actually a used one (though only slightly), but I
had to a good deal of levering the spring up to get it
to line-up with the verticals.
After battling with that fixed spring for 2 hours and
never having to do ANYTHING like that with the
swing-spring I can see why the wheel tuck is so severe
on the early models. But I can also see why the rear
is loosey-goosey on the 1500.
I agree with Joe C. The swing spring eliminates the
wheel tuck sufficiently for spirited driving but at
the expense of losing your rear support.
British parts northwest supposedly has an UPRATED rear
transverse leafspring you could try. It sounds good,
but I don't think they've been out long enough to see
if they will last the test of time. If you get 5 years
out of your transverse leaf spring, I'd say you're way
ahead of the game.
-Terry T.
http://www.firespitter.com/spitfire.html
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