Okay, so I'm not a "math guy", or a "science guy". (I think "physics" is the term that applies here actually, and I'm not one of THOSE GUYS either-) So can one of you edjamacated fellers tell me the HAZARDS involved in flipping leafs to lower a car? In other words, what problems arise from having the spring arc face UP instead of DOWN? The only thing I can come up with is reversing the springs direction might severely weaken it??? But I'm wondering if these issues be relieved with different shocks perhaps? Thanks!
Instead of pushing all the leafs together like normaly does it will kinda push them appart when there reversed... and i also cant see the ride being any good that way either!
I've done it! Didn't hurt anything. The springs didn't have a very big arch though. Lowered the car 6". Rode great. Drove it that way for over four years without a problem.
You're kidding right? You would have to remove the shorter springs and put them back on UNDER the main spring. Did you think before typing that?
Don't have an answer but a old timer once told me they use to do it back in the day and johnny law would pull them over thinking they were runnin moonshine. Later, Mark
Some cars come from the factory with springs under the axle. But I'm not sure I fully understand if this is the original poster's intention. He talks about making the arch face down???
Ive been thinking about doing this on my shoebox to avoid using blocks. Bob what car did you flip them on?
My dad did it years ago, and he had no problems at all. I don't really remember the ride quallaty or how long he had it but he never talked bad about it.
Wouldn't the spring then "shrink", or contract in its shackles, under compression, rather than "grow" under it, then? I would imagine you would have to watch for interference there, with you shackles, and their angles, so they don't over-center, perhaps? Not sure of any other possible problems....
Old School trick..done the way Bad Bob explains it..any other way is not using the noggin..( cant leave the pack the way it is and just flip it, it has to come apart and be re-***emebled in reverse manner) works, but sometimes depends on the car
I did the reverse. I went from spring under to spring over on a 65 Rambler. The ride was a little stiffer and the car was jacked up a good 5-6 inches.
Okay, I'm not talking about flipping the axle (it's already on top of the spring, blocks WILL lower it), I'm talking about turning the spring upside-down so the arc is reversed. Bad Bob, very much appreciated! And Von Rigg Fink- Thanks for clarifying! So, in summary, flipping the spring arc WILL work, but you need to keep the spring ORDER the same (when you flip the springs the little ones must still be on the bottom) Dude, I <3 the H.A.M.B., thanks guys!
Let me explain... When I got the Shoebox,it was bagged,with one leaf. The main one,just to keep the rear centered. It was all ****ed up! I took the ladder bars off and replaced the ****ed up leaf with stock leafs,main one flipped. Then I bought a pair of mono-leafs from Low Springs and flipped it. It worked great! Rode nice and was low! The only thing I never got around to doing was putting the shocks back on. Cause they were originally attached to the ladder bars. You might want to leave out the second biggest leaf. Mine had only four leafs,and no blocks,before the mono-leafs.
is the orig poster talking about flipping a leaf or 2 , or talking flipping the whole spring ***embly? I wouldn't recommend flipping the whole ***embly but I have had experience with flipping 1 or 2 leaves and re***embling the ***embly. It alters the spring rate slightly and will lower the ride hieght. .
I flipped the shackle over on the rear and got 3 inches. If I drop every other leaf I will get another inch or so. The front shackle on the rearend I moved the bottom 2 holes up to the top holes on the frame and welded angle on the frame to hold the top. This was to ***ure that the pinion angle doesn't change too drastically. This was on my 49 Ford F1....dont know what car you are trying to lower but if this looks like it will work for you I could explain more in detail.
Okay, don't flip the entire ***embly, but flipping the main one and maybe one more sounds good. Then, if it's not low enough, I'll get blocks... but I'm trying not to!
The 1950s Austin A40 Devon had rear springs setup this way from the factory. It was done to reduce oversteer while cornering (or so I was told).
take your spring packs to a spring shop and have them dearched. its usally 30 to 40 bucks per side. that should include hot tank repainted and new bushings. have them take 3" out and then put the blocks in. thats what i do when im trying for 3 to 6 inch drops
I just mentioned this to my buddy whose 35 2-dr sedan sits up too high. It never dawn on him to do it and he is a Furd guy. Mopar made their R-body from 79-81 with reversed rear springs.
I just did a flip spring, heres why, I needed 2 more inches of drop, I am already down to a mono leaf and 3 inches of blocks, i didnt want 5 inches of block, it makes the springs really low to the ground and looks tacky, also spring wrap increases do to more leverage on the spring, since my spring was de-arching ( the mono leaf was flat and started curving the other way, i desided to flip it, now with bags on it, theres only 8 inches of travel and the spring just does go flat, never goes into a de-arch position) so really its better on the spring this way. As for all the na- sayers the corvette, several mopars and all the 30-34 fords run a "reversed" spring, so its been done and done well. It does take some man handeling to get the spring in the perches, im running a s-10 spring under a 53 chevy 210
We did it with my 57 F100 trying to cheat out of a c-notch, but it ended it up lowering it so much I actually had to heighten the bed after notching the head of the bed over the frame a lil, then fabbed some riser blocks for sake of the fenders. We've since C-notched her, puttin in bags. Great experiment though.
If you mean actually flipping the spring, you also have to flip the leaves around in the opposite direction. Search for underslung and see what I mean. It works fine, really old Bugatti race cars actually came that way. Also more recently early Blazers came with a reverse arch on the front spring. You will have to deal with a shock length issue and probably have to C-notch your dh***is. If you are talking about moving your rearend to the top of the spring, commonly called flipping its also not an issue. Still have the ch***is clearance issue and shock length issue (depending on how your shocks are mounted) to deal with.
I just tried this on my shoebox. just by flipping the main leaf i got about 2" more drop the rest of the spring pack stayed as it was. I think by flipping the next 2 Springs I could eliminate my blocks alltogether.
I flipped the "main" leafs on my 56 Chevy...MANY years ago. No swapping, no turning around...JUST rotate the main leaf upside-down...leave all the rest of the leafs as is, use a "long" center bolt to pull it all back together and trim it to length after things are clamped up tight. I did it because 2" lowering blocks weren't quite enough (tall tires) and since I liked to DRIVE that car hard, I didn't want a long lowering block flopping over on its side and crashing me. You know..the whole "lever" thing and all. SO...I flipped the springs. My problem, was that it lowered the car a little too much and had to put air shockes on the car to split the difference. I didn't have the money back in the early 80's to do it right....and just have the springs rearched... As for putting the spring "under" the axle...done all the time...even the factories do/did this. Take a look at three pickups...I'd bet at least one of them has the spring setup this way. Mike
I've done the sprinp flip thing. I fliped the hole frame. It worked ok but it's like jacking a car up by the frame and the springs droop down and cancel out the action of the shacals so the only suspintion is that of the spring. The shacal let's the spring grow or shrink as it rebounds. I guess it worked ok but it was alittel stiffer. I have pictures in my album if u would like to see my setup .
As Bad Bob said previously you can't flip the main leaf without taking the stack apart and moving each leaf to the other side of the stack and re***embling it. Some of us already have that effect with old sagging springs or springs that have a couple of leaves removed and are sagging more than a bit. The front of my 48 included in that batch.
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