With a boot full of camping gear and 4 bikes on the towbar rack, my lancer estate sits down noticeably at the rear (just occasionally I miss my old Xantia which would just pump itself up a glide away). The ideal would be to fit self levelling suspension but I've no doubt it would be prohibitively expensive, even I could find a supplier. I've come across a product on ebay called a spring assister, which seems to be a rubber packer that you wind into the coil. has anyone used such a thing and are they any good ?
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Yes, they do work in that they stiffen the spring. However they stiffen the spring by taking part of the spring out of use, which puts a greater load on the rest of the spring!
The best spring assisters I used replaced the bump stop with a longer, hollow rubber bump stop.
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Yes, in the old days there were things like small footballs that you fitted inside the springs and could inflate them to various pressures.
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>>The best spring assisters I used replaced the bump stop with a longer, hollow rubber bump stop.
I agree, these provide a proper parallel loadpath, and can actually reduce the stress in the spring for a laden car compared with the case of the un-modified laden car.
The types which fit between the coils, thus rendering them solid impose extra stress on the coils, as there is only one loadpath - if I could avoid it, I would not use devices of this type.
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Thanks for your input. I can't find anything on the 'net like the bumpstop replacement you've described. I did come across this company offering uprated springs though.
www.graystonengineering.com/spring%20assisters%20p...m
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" >>The best spring assisters I used replaced the bump stop with a longer, hollow rubber bump stop."
These were called Aeon. The company that now owns the name, and sells the products, is in the USA, www.timbren.com/ and you should visit this site for product details, application lists, FAQs, etc.
There is a UK agent, who happens to have told me the prices go up 10% on 1st July 2008.
David McCormick at
Ride Solutions
33 Illingworth Way
Foxton
Cambridge CB2 6RY, U.K.
tel. 00 44 (0) 1223 701012
mob. +44 (0) 7711 272473
www.rubbersuspension.com/
Have Fun
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I fitted some aux springs to a car a few years ago, when we were camping and caravanning travelling with five people and kit in the car. They were a lighter duty coil spring that fitted inside the main spring and had end caps that fitted specifically to the vehicle. The aux springs are under very little load whilst the car is reasonably lightly loaded (just enough load to hold them in place), but take up some of the strain when tha cars own springs are more heavily loaded.
I was very pleased with the results and they were a doddle to fit.
Got them from a company called MAD Suspension and they cost around £70.
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Thanks Davmal - very useaful thread. Well for me anyway... :)
I never knew you could do this!
My hearse of an estate is going to get revamped on the rear and soon!
My hobby of fishing see's my car going up and down dirt tracks/canals/riverbanks all of the time and bottoming out the suspension is a real issue - looks like it won't be from next week!
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The link I posted above for Greyston engineering is for the type of secondary spring you describe. They don't list my car, so I'm awaiting a response to the email I sent them.
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My father used autoballans for many years in his cars (loaded car and caravan) - they are the inflatable ball type - they worked for him, I was too young to notice much. Allows you to leave them in but deflate them when you don't need the assistance.
First hit on google brings up a Dutch company.
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I too have used MAD for both coil springs that fit inside normal springs, these were excellent & MAD also still make the ballons that fit inside the springs and inflate & they are brilliant. When my caravan was on the back i used to inflate the balls untill the car was level again.
I doc
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The problem with those types is that they seem to need to sit inside the spring and don't work with a lot of the modern strut type suspensions.
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