Question on my springs - CEG Archives

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I know my suspension is well near the end of its life, but I have a question. I had/have my rear wheels on and off to strip and paint the drums. I was playing with the suspension because of mentioned above. and I noticed, should I be able to compress the spring by hand? and if so, how much? I could probably work the spring out by hand with the suspension unsprung.

Originally posted by ZeroHour:
I know my suspension is well near the end of its life, but I have a question. I had/have my rear wheels on and off to strip and paint the drums. I was playing with the suspension because of mentioned above. and I noticed, should I be able to compress the spring by hand? and if so, how much? I could probably work the spring out by hand with the suspension unsprung.

Dont do it. the springs are compressed more then you think... When bill and I were doing the corolla suspension when he would undo the nut with his air gun the strut mount plate would shoot across the damn driveway. Hell of a lot of fun

What you do for strut/spring removal, is undo the bottom of the assembly at the hub, then undo it at the strut tower, from there you can remove the whole assembly.. If you have an air gun (You better for this job) have a buddy hold the strut/spring assembly on the ground then you undo the bolt and the mount should shoot off. the rear suspension on the corolla was hardly even pressured (the springs were sagging).

doing a suspension really isnt as hard as it seems... especially if you have an air gun

What if you don't have a air gun? I have one at home but I'm not there for 3 more weeks and even then I'll be there for less than a week before college starts. Can you give a estimate for doing the back with a gun as opposed to without so I don't start somehting I can't finish without it? I have all the other tools.

You by no means need airtools. They would be nice, but not needed.

And letting your springs decompress like that is an awesome idea if you want to seriously injure yourself.

Rent a spring compressor, they're free!

lol
Take Two:

Okay let me restate the point I was trying to make. I can compress my springs by hand, when the car is jacked up. If I would fight with them I could probably get them out or unmounted. Should I replace them? lol

I wasn't going to take the springs off by hand. I just wanted to know if the spring should be soft like that when the tire was off the ground.

You can't compress the springs by hand. You can grab a middle coil and move it up and down, or squeeze two coils closer together, but that's very different than compressing them.

I still haven't gotten an answer. lol Do they need to be replaced if I can compress the coils by hand? Or should they have some play when the car is up in the air?

if u can compress them by hand i would say that isnt a good thing. i dont believe u should be able to even budge them when they r on the car and the car even jacked up. thats why a spring compressor is required when removing them. i would guess those r shot springs.

So my question to you now is..........does the rear of your car drag on the ground when you drive around?

If you can compress the springs by hand, then how in the hell does it hold the weight of the car?

No I do have some nice sag in the back. Like I said I know the suspension is worn.

Not dragging on the ground...lol

I'm going to order Koni springs after I cash my checks on friday.