Pros and cons of cutting spring coils.

the cool thing about these is when one fails it looks like the car is launching off the line, they also make great projectiles but are hard to aim.

 

I have cut many sets of s10 coils 1 1/2 coils cut off give you 3" drop , they ride good , just index the coil as far as start of the spring, make sure it seats back in the pocket correct and then take it out and drive it plus bounce it a little to get it to settle( about a week) then re measure then get it aligned before you eat up tires

 

pros: good looks for almost no cost

cons: you get **** from the internet know-it-all crowd for not doing it "the right way" (i.e. buying drop coils)

 

I cut a coil and a half out of my coils on a 66 f100. Lowered it about 3 inches and road soo much better. I guess those springs where just old and lost its spring rate.

 

I'm in a little different dilemma. My Mustang II in my 40 pickup project came with 300# springs. I installed a 401 Buick Nailhead at 675 lbs. TCI exchanged the lighter springs for 375#. These are designed for big block cars. My problem is they are 14” tall and I have to stuff them into a 8 1/2” space. I attempted to install one today and even with the weight of the nailhead I could not get them to seat in the pockets right and the ball joints were ****ed out of shape. I'm going to try a internal spring compressor tomorrow to see if that will work. I also changed the spindles from 2” drop to stock to raise the car some. If I do have to cut coils, I'm not looking to drop it much but just enough to get these damn things in there and still have the lower A arms ride level.

 

To far is just far enough.


But seriously my car rides like **** haha. the price you pay to look cool.

 

This one got me!

Have a 53 Chevy coupe w/Mustang II. Had stock spindles and stock springs. Cut the stock springs 1 full coil to lower it about 1.5 inches which made for a stiffer ride. Eventually went to 2" dropped spindles w/300# springs. Got the same height and a softer ride.

Pro - Cheap but may not work out to your satisfaction

Con - May not work out to your satisfaction

 

As the rest said, cutting is free except labor. It will increase the spring rate by the percentage of the coils you cut off. So if the stock coil has 10 coil windings and you remove 1 coil, it has a 10% stiffer rate. Remove 2 coils and the rate is 20% stiffer. The drop you get you can approximate by comparing the distance between coils when the car is sitting. The coil is about halfway between the A-arm pivot and the ball joints. So if the coil spacing is 1 inch, the drop for one coil is *about* 2 inches.

Cut the spring with a cutoff wheel for the best way. Do *not* heat with a torch to lower. This dows two bad things: it destroys the heat treatment in the spring, and it makes it change dimensions in non-uniform way. If you want to ruin your springs and your ride quality, then heat the springs. Or do it the right way and remove the springs first and cut a coil or so, then reinstall.

 

The internal spring compressor worked great but all this didn't work or look to well. With the stock spindles and the 375 springs it raised it another 5" and is 10" from pavement to bottom of the grill chin. Too high now.

 

Use the Aerostar springs for all of the reasons we have stated in the past. If you want the *** end lower afterwards use lowering blocks. Mine only lowered 2 inches- Just right for me.

 

I had a 56ford pu mII frontend,guy said he put v8 mustang spring,has a 302 v8 and rode stiff and a arms were not level.
I took a hack saw and cut one full coil,it lowed now level but to low and went to larger tire.Maybe the 56 is nose heavy ,Mine went down NOT up.My spring maybe were olded Mustang v8 and not after market.