Technical I know it's wrong, but how wrong is it?

No spring spreader used. I broke the spring pack down and assembled the main leaf onto the axle, then reassembled the pack

 

Really nice looking ride, very cool. '39 Standards are unique with classy lines around that nose. I would err on the side of safety and replace those heated/bent leaves. That is antiquated, questionable engineering at best. Good luck.

 

Quote from Gary Addcox; "That is antiquated, questionable engineering at best." end of Quote.
Okay, that does it! I'm going to go buy a Brand New Volvo. Then I'm calling the Hulk Hauler and get this place cleaned out. It's all going to Scrap cause I don't want any of you Guys driving these Un-safe vehicles. Safety first wins. I don't know how I ever lived this long driving these Old unsafe Cars.
The Wizzard,,, Oh, good Saturday morning L.o.L!!!!!!

 

You are a lucky risk-taker.

As I have mentioned, the unlucky ones aren't here to tell their story.

You can stick to your single point data set, and pretend that it uniformly extrapolates into a statistically significant one all you want. It still does not.

Nobody is saying to drive a modern Volvo. All they are saying is to get rid of a highly suspect leaf spring.

I am not guessing at any of this. Whether it is metallurgy, suspension dynamics, or risk analysis, or anything else involved, I am not only formally educated in it, I do it for a living.

I am not talking private hot rod shop, either. I am an engineer at General Motors these days.

You are not only bragging about not killing yourself playing Russian Roulette, you are now claiming to everyone that it is safe.

All over changing out a torched spring.

Enough with the specious logic already.

Sent from my SM-G900T using The H.A.M.B. mobile app

 

Quote from gimpyshotrods; "You are a lucky risk-taker." end of quote.
Quote again; "I am an engineer at General Motors these days."
I believe your as Full of yourself from where you stand as as I am Lucky.
The Wizzard

 

Cool car! I always like those front ends. I'm thinking about looking at a 39 standard for sale here in MD. It's in the HAMB classified right now.

 

Hay Guys, I got to thinking after I posted this last remark up. I am in no way saying Gimpy shot Rod is wrong in his way of thinking or doing anything. Also I will say you should Not just do as I have and I may never do the same process again as I have in the past. We all have our own reason for the choices we make and this barking between he and I just goes to show what I have said hundreds of times before. No matter where you stand on any topic here on the H.A.M.B. you will find some one that stands 180 degrees from you. It makes for good discussion and most of all should make you THINK for yourself.
Gimpyshotrods, my hand is extended to you with respect for your opposite way of thinking from my own.
The Wizzard

 

Cool story, bro.

Sent from my SM-G900T using The H.A.M.B. mobile app

 

Well, I'm not sure if I should apologize or laugh. What I started as an innocent thread about something I didn't have any knowledge about turned into quite the debate. My dad was a hot rodder, born in 1932. His uncle, my great uncle, owned a garage in Melvin Village, NH, so from the time he could ride his bicycle from his home in Moultonboro to Melvin Village, he was wrenching on cars. When he could drive, mid 1940's, as the stories go, you could go to the junk yard and buy a running Model A couple for $20 to $40. At that time, there was no Super Bell, no Magnum Axle Company, no Posies... So in order to achieve what they wanted - lowered suspension, different brakes, etc - it was all home engineering. So of course it was old school to heat a spring to lower the suspension. But the way I see it now, we are fortunate to have the options we do. If you want to lower you car via heating the springs, by all means do it, your choice. But for some of us, peace of mind is knowing we have a new spring on the front that was made for that specific purpose. I don't understand the ridicule in this thread for making a choice.

 

Dadn5kids, Laugh, just laugh! then think some and laugh some more.

 

It is not about making a choice.

It is about informed consent.

You, and everyone else, has the freedom and liberty to do something dangerous.

That is your right, as a citizen of this great nation.

Informed consent means you knew, and accepted the attendant risks.

Telling people that there is no risk, when there is a patently extant and profoundly demonstrably one is disingenuous and mean.

Criticizing those who simply want the risk to be understood is the height of hubris.

Sent from my SM-G900T using The H.A.M.B. mobile app

 

Gimpyshotrods,
Please don't take this as the least bit sarcastic. Can you explain specifically why this is a "stupid thing to do"? Does heating the spring weaken it? Is it a geometry thing? Before all of the upleasantness started, Pist-n-broke mentioned that, even if the spring broke, the axle would still be held by the wishbones and the other end of the spring, and it would only settle until the axle hit the frame. Obviously, depending on how fast the car was going, or whether turning forces were involved, this could still be a serious situation. My question is, assuming the spring wasn't quenched (which would be pretty hard to do with it on the car), is it more likely to break than a shackle, a spring perch, a shackle bolt? I'm not trying to be argumentative, just honestly trying to educate myself. Again, I've mentioned before the concerns I have with how this particular spring was bent. Assuming all of the leaves had free motion, is it still dangerous?

 

Do you know exactly to what temperature to which the spring was heated?
Do you know exactly how long it was held at that temperature?
Do you know what the ambient temperature was when the heating was done?
Do you know if any forced cooling was applied?
If any forced cooling was done, what was the means?
If any forced cooling was done, what was the cooling rate?

If your answer to ANY of these questions is "I don't know", then you have a spring (if it still technically is one) of unknown metallurgical properties.

Keep in mind as well, you need to repeat these question for both ends of the spring.

In this application, the axle is not solely located by the wishbones. It is located and supported by a combination of both the wishbones AND the spring.

In the case of a failed main leaf, at speed, there will be sufficient force generated to deform and collapse a wishbone, and even snap the opposite side perch bolt/snap the shackle.

Remember, if one side of this suspect spring failed when it was doing half of the work, how well do you think the other side will do, when it is doing all of the work?

What happens after the failure is up to physics and environmental conditions.

All of this nonsense is a competition between those saying to get a fresh spring, and those displaying hubris.

I'm sticking with the spring.

 

Brings up a question, what would be your views on the guys who drop axles? I assume the same questions would need to be addressed?

 

Gimpys,
I was trying to ask about bending springs in general, must not have been clear. I never suggested that he keep this spring. Your points about these front ends, and the failure possibilities are well taken. The question remains, is bending springs with heat stupid? Also, I would add Pittman and steering arms to the axle question. I understand the shortfalls of anecdotal evidence, but it does have a certain value. A lot of the "rules" have their roots in word of mouth wisdom. Hot rodders have been heating and bending for generations.

 

Sorry. Posted that before I was done. To continue, is there significant anecdotal evidence of lots of springs breaking in the early days?

 

Pitman arms, and the like, and springs, are two very different things, metallurgically speaking.

They have different structures, and react differently to heat.

I can do a write-up on both, but not in the next few hours. I am typing on my phone, left handed, while my right arm is being tattooed.

 

"traditional" is a reflection of a style from the past. Doing something half-assed and crappy just because "that's how we did it back then" does not equate to traditional. If you watched a guy torch his springs to lower his ricer Honda, you would be deriding them before the metal became red. And yes, I am an engineer and work with welding, metallurgy and have built military vehicles for years.

 

If that were my car I would take it to the spring shop near me (Palmer Spring, Providence Rhode Island) and have them build me a new spring. They would look at the car, take some measurements and literally the next day have a custom spring that would have the car at the same height with the proper shackle angle for under 250 bucks. I've had springs built for off topic and on topic stuff. I've also reversed my own springs on a forge both front and rear.
Truth be told I'd actually just drive as is for a while but the function is certainly compromised. And I'm sure it would be fine but in the grand scheme its not much to have it set up right

 

I've wondered about spring mods and finally decided to Google "bending spring steel" after reading about this dilemma. As I thought, there is a fair amount (heating ranges, treating the metal) to doing it right and I quickly found people wondering what to do after they'd broken spring steel they'd tried to bend. When the spring was bent, this car was probably a jalopy with the person doing it in their back yard and without the advantage of advice from a professional or the internet. And its a fairly radical bend compared to others. Chances are that they did it at least a part of the job wrong. Adam is right about going to a spring specialist. First, though, I'd look thru the products of the companies who manufacture chassis components and see how they are doing it. If you don't know the history of who did the spring, when they did it and how they did it, I'd park it until you are sure things are safe. You probably have figured all the above out already so this is just a two-cents comment.

 

Well, shit. I bent my springs, and now I'm half-assed and crappy. Just kidding. Really, though, I'd have to take issue with that definition of traditional. "Following or conforming to tradition, adhering to past practices..." is what my dictionary says. There are a whole bunch of things on the Hamb that could be replaced by less "half-assed and crappy" modern solutions. Also not sure the ricer analogy holds up (but I have to admit it stings a little), given the differences is suspension design. Leaf springs are way overbuilt compared to coil springs. Probably because they play a stronger structural role in the design of the suspension. There is a pretty good body of anecdotal evidence about heated coil springs breaking, but modern springs are usually made of different steel than our old ones, so... I'm just trying to establish if this has been a common problem with leaf springs in the past? Again, not suggesting the OP drives his car with that spring. I think, on this thread at least, there seem to be two camps. The "do it yourself cheaply" group, and the "go buy a new part/pay somebody to fix it" group. Which one is more traditional? That's not a dig at people who buy/pay for their parts and work, plenty of folks in the first group would join the second group if we had the money. I'm not going to post on this anymore, though. I've been lurking here long enough to know how these things can end up, and I don't want to make any enemies. Plus, I feel like we've kind of hijacked the original thread.

 

Hmm..... This is a quandry right here. I am sure the person that bent that spring like that may have known a little bit about what he was doing. He had to have used a longer main leaf to bend it at that angle to get the shackle to hang at the correct angle and lower it to his liking. Would I trust it? How long ago was it done and how many miles has it been driven?

Not sure about the metallurgy of it?

I am not sure of the metallurgy of the junk that comes out of China.

Mr. G. M. Engineer, can you trust that every single spring ever made by GM is of proper metallurgy? I am sure they are not all tested when produced. Some may be questionable. But then, that is why tech/mechanics like me stayed busy doing warranty work.

Yes, I have replace broken springs under warranty. Some broke, some just didn't hold their ride hight. It happens.

That spring appears to have held up just fine. It wouldn't bother me to go cruising in it.

Sent from my Moto G Play using The H.A.M.B. mobile app

 

The V.O.L.V.O formerly known as the h.a.m.b.
From the archives:
How to take the battery out of your car so not to harm others
Install a steering column with airbag

Feature Story:
The Meltdown Drags now a success for safety as racing is cancelled and participants just meet without their cars and enjoy biscuits and tea.

V.O.L.V.O Alliance discount on the Baleigh roof stretcher for side air bags. See Flop use it to install 4 side airbags in a 3-window.

 

http://www.hotrod.com/articles/0709sr-1939-ford-deluxe-sedan/

there.

 

Good luck guys. I am departing this stupidity.

If you want to take totally unnecessary risks, to save $150, have fun.

I don't wish ill on anyone, unlike some of you.

 

I'm all about people making their own choices but my worry is that Dad because he has 5 kids will look for a low price on that spring and because it is now beautiful and shiny he will buy low priced chinese made spindles and a chinese made axle and in the end his front end will be a hundred fold more prone to failure than that fine Henry Ford made spring that gave many owners good service over tens of thousands of miles.

 

Actually, VonWegener, I'm the complete opposite. I refuse to buy something just based on price. My family is too precious to try to save $10 on an item, when I know spending that few extra dollars will give me a lifetime of service and quality. My plan, after all this, is get a 35/36 axle, have it dropped correctly, use unsplit 35/36 bones, a correct length spring, and install it as a single unit. I've already sourced a 2nd set of 37-41 spindles, now to find the rest of the parts. I'll take my time, and make it correct.

 

Heating the spring destroys the Temper of the spring.
The heat affected zone, (HAZ), is now soft.
Basic heat treating.

Can you get away with it as shown.
Probably. Most of the stresses are in the middle.
Is it correct ? NO.

 

Yes, I did work at a spring company, making prototypes.
Customers included military and Aerospace.

 

Yes this was very common back in the day. Quick and cheap method of getting the car a couple of inches lower without the work of installing a dropped axle. I would replace the spring with one of the new ones available and have one of the guys here on the HAMB that do axles drop yours for you.