Okay, I know everyone talks about removing leaves from a leaf spring. But, here's my question- When you remove leaves, does it lower the vehicle by the thickness of the leaf being removed? Or, does each leaf give some spring support and will lower it more than the thickness of the spring would indicate? I have a 1960 F-100 and need it to come down about 2-3 inches in the back. It has 9 leafs in each spring. The bottom 3 of them are not arched, and are just straight- so they are just overload springs and can come out-- right? Please set me straight.
Yep ,the bottom 3 are a form of overload. So you remove them you will drop the total of their thickness. The other leaves each carry a portion of the load so when you remove one of them you will drop by the leave's thickness AND the amount of load it suports. For starts I would leave in those 3 "overloads and remove 2 or 3 of the others. Counting the main leaf as #1 remove #3 ,#5 and # 7 and see where that gets you.The idea behind leaving the "overloads" in is to try to keep things from hard bottoming out on a bad bump. Plan on shuffling leaves at least twice befor you get what you want. BTDT!!
Have you ever heard of flipping leafs over the main leaf instead of removing them altogether? You lose less spring rate this way, which helps from getting a ride that's too soft that bottoms out all the time. Also, I think it's more solid and just supports the entire pack better. No matter what though, don't flip the leaf right under the main leaf, do the one after that or whichever one below that depending on how low you want to go. I did this at each corner of my truck and it lowered it about 3-4". Been driving it like this for a little while now with no problems.
I'm a bit confused on the illustration above. So you take a spring out from the stack and put it upside down and on top of the main spring? How does that lower the truck?
Years ago on a 55 Chevy 1/2 ton we flipped over the main leaf only,(reversing the eyes) all around and dropped about 4" with no ride effect,labor intensive but free!!!
When you bolt the entire pack back together, not only is the leaf no longer supporting the weight of the truck (which lowers it a bit), but it is now also trying to force the entire leaf pack to be more flat, since it is in negative arc. Its bolted together in the middle and the ends of the flipped leaf are trying to push the ends of the leaf pack down (less arc), which when its all bolted together in the truck, essentially brings the center of the leaf pack up (where the axle bolts to) when the spring is fully loaded. It's a bit difficult to explain, but it really works great.
HUMMMMMM !! A interesting thought!! I understand the reasoning there. But I bet it's fun trying to get it back together under the truck, getting the center bolt in that is.
Well what I did was use a couple of those long clamps to just hold it loosely in place while I put a long threaded rod all the way threw the pack. Then I just wrenched a nut all the way down the rod until the leafs were completely packed. Then I used the clamps again to hold it compressed like this while I pulled the threaded rod out and installed the little correct bolt.
Can you say SPROOOONG !!!! LoL . Yep I done many a leaf spring in the car trying to get exactly the ride/look i wanted. Had a 49 Ford F1 must of had the damm springs out of each end a half a dozen times before I was happy.
The only difference is that these bolts have a round nub instead of a hexagonal head. The nub is used to position the leaf spring on the axle, which has a little hole for it to sit in. Just hold it tight with some channel locks, and if it slips no matter what you do, then put the nub in the vise, lock it real tight, spray some penetrating oil on it, and un-wrench the nut.
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