What leaf springs bolt in 52 Chevy?

I am looking at swaping the rearend out in my 52. I have a rearend out of a 57 chevy. What springs will bolt right up if there are any? thanks

 

I still have mine. They will work ok with the 57 Rearend?

 

I had a '56 under my '52, I had to move the spring perches a bit. I just carefully cut them off and tacked them where I needed them. You also have to account for front to back centering in the wheel well. The pin locator hole in the spring pad needs to be re-drilled like 1 1/2 inches forward to have the axle in the right place.

I put lowering blocks in and drilled the hole in those to center the axle. Was easier to drill aluminum and keep the perches stock.

 

CHASSIS ENGINEERING AND POSSIES both make great kits to put modern leafs under 49-54 chevys

a few people have tried putting camaro,nova etc leafs its easy enough to mount them but the car will sit like a 4x4 as the spring is wrong for the car.

you can keep the stock springs if they are still ok the centering pin is in the wrong spot,you need to roughly move the diff forward 1.5 inches and inward 3/4 inches.

hope this helps.


i used the kit from chassis engineering with a 2nd gen camaro diff. i had to put new spring perches on the diff witch was not hard at all and the springs went it easy peasy lemon squeezy.

 

It's a lot easier to use yours, and most likely less expensive. Moving a perch around is no big deal.

Yes there are a few good kits out there if you decide to go that route, but then you might as well use a more modern rear and sell the '57 to some one else.

 

sounds good guys! Thanks alot. I am trying to stay cheaper.

 

If you are going cheap, then use the 57 rear and drill the locating hole where it needs to be. You didn't mention if you want to lower the car, it kind of makes a difference in deciding what is the best thing to do.

 

If you're cheap, sell the 57 rear - and get a 2nd gen camaro, or blazer 4x4 rear end instead. mho.

 

I am going to lower it.

 

If you're going to lower it, just do what I did with mine - have someone make you a pair of lowering blocks about 5" long out of box tube, drill and tap a hole in the top for a cap screw to use as a locating pin for the hole on the '57 rearend, line up the rear in the car and mark it and then drill a hole in the bottom for the pin that's on the spring.

I used a '75 Camaro rearend in mine, but the principle is the same, and plenty of guys have used 55-57 rearends without moving the perches.

 

A lot of the store bought lowering blocks have 2 sets of holes in them already. Lets you move the rear while lowering it.

 

That won't necessarily work because most blocks are made for two inch wide springs and the stock Chevy ones are 1 3/4 inches - the hole has to be moved inward as well as forward. I found with mine with some cheap parts store blocks that the pin hole was going to have to be either just outside of or in the front edge of the block, which is why I had a set made with an extra inch at the front.

I alos found I had to have new bottom plates made for the U-bolts to go through - that's because of where the shock mounts are on the stock ones. They're both ahead of the axle and inboard of the springs; the Camaro the rearend came out of had one ahead and one behind. I came up with a way to make it work, though. A C-channel for the bottom plate with an extra tab on the inboard side, and an L-shaped piece bolted on the front for the shock bolt to go through.

 

I got the lower plates also. I can machine some aluminum blocks. The cap screw is a good Idea thanks..