i cut my springs, i need help

[boner1115]

so i was lowering my car by just cutting the springs, the front left spring worked perfectly, but the front right spring popped off of the shock. so i am not sure how to get it back on, i had tried to jsut force it back on but i cant get it on even so it keeps popping off. i was curious if any of you had done the same. oh bye the way i cut the bottem of the springs, and i only cut one 1.5 inches off. so anythign ideas will help. thanks.

[grygst76]

Buy springs already made for the car that are lowered, when you cut 20 year old springs you are asking for trouble regardless. They make you bottom out harder number 1, plus the spring is compromised from the heat or however you cut it.

Also the reason you cannot get the spring to stay on the support....

[dupra87]

u should have cut them at the top then u wouldnt have ad the problem

[jdmmilhouse]

u should of cut from the top

[mirage83]

Shouldn't cut them at all. Best fix is to replace the ones you cut with springs which are designed to lower the car.

[MA70-3.0GT]

Agreed, stock springs (or any springs for that matter) should not be cut as the temper of the metal can be affected by heat, as already mentioned.
Plus, and this is the one a lot of people don't consider, the spring rate (the poundage of weight required to compress a spring a certain amount) is worked out with the stress being divided between all of the coils, if you start removing 2 or 3 coils from a spring that has say 25 coils then you've effectively increased the load that has to be taken by the remaining coils by around 1/8th (12.5% or on a 1500kg car about an extra 175kg) & thus made the spring softer as well as shorter. 25 is a lot of coils to start with and the less coils that were on the original before cutting, or the more coils removed, increases this percentage considerably This increases the chances of bottoming out & also can mean that the springs are to all intents and purposes dangerously overloaded.

OK, on some less "finessed" cars you can get away with it because the working tolerances aren't so close (provided the MoT/DOT man doesn't notice), but on something that's already been tuned to give a sporty ride from the factory & potentially will be hitting 150+mph, there's not really much room for error, hence why companies make a lot of money selling uprated & lowered springs, because that's the only safe & legal way of doing the job.

[boner1115]

OMG are you kidding me it has been like 4 years since I originally posted this, and still no one here could possibly think of telling me to flip my spring over. i am really happy that like 7 people thought it would be helpful to tell me over and over again not to do it. lets try and see if anyone here is capable and making a helpful comment on any forum. i am so tired of all this forum bullshit where 95 percent of all posts and people just bashing on everyone and not being helpful in any way.

I hope that some day I am cool enough to sit at home all day and post useless comments on forums to try and make my self feel better about myself by putting other people down.

[mirage83]

How's this for a helpful hint... don't do something stupid like cutting your springs and you won't end up with people mentioning that it was a stupid thing to do. As for your spring problem, the only real solution is to replace them since they're screwed.

Or, you could go like you're going and simply try to get by with a compromised suspension. Your choice of course, but don't blame us for pointing out that it isn't a very bright idea.

[MA70-3.0GT]

OK, helpful hint No.2. If you really give that little of a damn about your car's safety & legality (not to mention other road users when the springs finally collapse and send you through the median) then just carry right on & turn them springs over. I decided not to suggest it simply because if you read my original post, which you'll note is not in any way "bashing" or insulting you, merely giving you the facts of road spring metallurgy, you'll realise that using the springs in their cut condition makes them overloaded & thus DANGEROUS.

See that word? DANGER, you know what it means right? Sorry but you asked for this because you can't take a simple hint that you're doing something wrong... If you don't like it then please go and find some other forum to post on because I'm sure the moderators & most members would agree we do not need your type around here.

P.S. Sorry it's taken so long for anyone to reply, maybe it's because we all thought you were taking the mick?

[Peter.J]

Originally Posted by boner1115

so i was lowering my car by just cutting the springs, the front left spring worked perfectly, but the front right spring popped off of the shock. so i am not sure how to get it back on, i had tried to jsut force it back on but i cant get it on even so it keeps popping off. i was curious if any of you had done the same. oh bye the way i cut the bottem of the springs, and i only cut one 1.5 inches off. so anythign ideas will help. thanks.

you could use a spring compressor. auto zone has a free tool rental service just be careful. you may have to remove shock/strut from car to complete the work. good luck!