Hey gang. I’m going to cut my front coils by 1.5 coils. (I’m hoping for about 3.5” lower). And add 3” lowering blocks in rear. But I want another 1” or 1.5” in the rear. I think i remember someone telling me to try removing one of the center leaves for about 1” lower. Anyone have experience with this? Any tips? MANY THANKS! TED
Read the various threads dealing with de-arching leaf springs. Pulling leaves is a bad idea in just about every situation, especially on a heavy car.
I searched on “de-arching” leaves and did not find any threads talking about how to do it and why to do it. What is the main reason to NOT remove one of the center leaves? Many thanks!
I don’t like removing centers…I’m more apt to do a lower for a 1” lower. I know this sounds funny but lowering the rear a a 50’s car with smaller wheel openings, even after taking off the fender skirts, restricts your ability to change a flat tire. I need and carry two jacks. A scissor under the axle to just raise the tire and original bumper jack to raise the body. My rims are only 1” wider than stock and I use narrow 75 series tires.
De-arching springs is usually done by a spring shop. Have you researched dropped leaf springs for your car? I installed them on my 53 Ford and dropped it 2". Still retains a good spring rate. As @302GMC stated, removing leaves is a bad idea on a heavy car. It puts additional stress on the remaining leaves (now 70 years old), which could result in broken springs. Why not go 4" lowering blocks?
I got under my car with a ruler….and i measured that with 4” blocks installed…the bottom of the shock absorber is only 3” off the ground. Man that is low. If i ever get a flat…the shock absorber will be s****ing on the ground. And if i ever run over anything thats sticking up only 3”….it’ll smash into my shocks. Which is why I’m thinking it’s smarter to do a very low static drop with a combo of blocks & pulling a leaf.
as others have said pulling leaves is a bad idea on a heavy car. Usually 4 inch lowering requires C notching the frame at the kickup and raising the driveshaft tunnel in the floor
Measure how much space you have between the bump stop and the top of the axle. You may not be able to lower it as much as you want without a C notch.
READ THAT THREE TIMES and then crawl under the car with a tape measure. 4 inch blocks may at best leave you two inches between the axle and the frame on that car. Secondly, a 53 Cad was one of the best riding cars on the road in 53 and removing the wrong spring would screw up the ride. Paul Harper built one of the best looking 53 Cads ever built (it's somewhere in Cali nows) and he never said how much he lowered it but it looked just right.
So i got back under the car and measured the bump stop travel. It’s currently 6.5” of travel for the bump stops on the side rails and 5.5” of travel for the bump stop on the diff housing. But my car currently is just a shell: no spare tire in the trunk, no door cards at all, no back seat, no side gl***, no sound mats, no dirty secrets in the trunk, etc. So i decided to install a 3” lowering block & cut 1.5 coils in the front then go for some long happy test drives.
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