Now before you ask...please refer this following link. It is a link to a tread on a local car enthusiast board. Please read and give me your opinions. Please read the entire thread..its only 2 pages long.

http://forums.ok-speed.com/showthread.php4?t=2035

Khoi

 

I admit to doing some skimming, but I got the basic idea of the thread. Yes it is possible to calculate the rate of springs after cutting. You can also calculate what ride height difference it should make. Does the person cutting the spring know what rate is needed to prevent bottoming for a given ride height? Coil springs are just a long torsion bar bent around a bunch of times. Everyone understands a torsion bar, right? Make it shorter, cut coils, it gets stiffer. The part you grip, dead coils, is not part of the spring rate.

Most springs are made to sit flat or in a specific pocket on the shock. Will the cut ones sit properly? Could they damage themselves or the shock or mount area? Modern springs are made from cold bent steel. They are very prone to rusting which is why they have paint that holds up so well. The cut ends could be a corrosion starting point. I've seen people who cut springs nick a few other coils when cutting. That will cause a stress riser and possible failure point.

The comment that cut springs are often used on old worn-out shocks and suspension sounds correct. But, I have seen a lot of lowering springs used on cars with old shocks too. Lets not forget getting an alignment afterwards too.

 

Good info!

 

why dont you save some money and buy some ebay springs? its better than ******* up your
springs. my friend once did this to his camry. we had to torch and bend the springs so that
it'll seat properly on the strut mount.

btw, this is in the civic forum too.

 

They are wrong. They are ricers, and anyone advocating cutting springs is a ******* idiot. Their examples are wrong and their logic is wrong (and incomplete). For christ sake you would think that with all the **** they are talking, one of them, just ******* one of them would have picked up a god damn book.

Changing the number of coils alters the sping rate. That's the way it is....death, taxes man.

K=springs rate, na (n sub a) is the number of active coils, P is the load, R is the avg coil radius, d is the diameter, a G is the shear modulus (whatever that is).

K = P/ä = Gd4 / 64naR3

Or read about it here: http://www.engin.umich.edu/lab...ssion/

Do a search for it on the web, their are java based spring rate calculators if you don't want to do the math, but the number of coils is a factor.

Cheers,
Roy

 

why would anyone consider cut springs with the amount of cheap spring companies out there today?

 

You can buy 4 excellent Eibach springs for $200. So Im sure you can find 4 generic springs for under $100, maybe used. Why bother even going through the hassel to cut your springs. What a hack job.

That guy Justin a friggin idiot and a ricer. Spring rates are determined by the material and number of coils, he says number of coils has nothing to do with it. And says he did his "research". lol

 

Correct, cutting springs w/o engineering is pointless and stupid.

 

thanks for all of the replies....I am also Sohc Driver on ok-speed...i needed opinions, because i had no concrete proof of why cutting springs was bad eventhough i knew it was. The only thing i could base my opinions on was on peoples' words and stores, but no concrete facts.

Khoi