Cheap rear spring alternative ?

discopotato03 · Post by **discopotato03** » Sat May 05, 2007 8:46 am

New to me but possibly not others , at USMB there is a short thread on using 86-89 Honda Accord front springs in the back of an L Series . It mentions that the ride height and spring rate goes up but there are some minor issues to overcome - possibly to do with pre load and free length .

Cheers Adrian .

lukes6 · Post by **lukes6** » Mon May 21, 2007 9:19 am

I have fitted the accord springs in the back of my l series and they are great. A lot stiffer but still drivable. The do give you some extra lift but if you are using standard shocks you wont benifit much from this. The only problem i have found is that because they are longer if you bottom them out you will tear the spring seat off your shock tower. To fix this you just need to drop the spring seat down on the shock. (Careful if welding, shock absorbers shoot flames if you blow a holes in them!). I have also added big bore shocks and done away witht the standard ones so that i can get more travel but you dont have to go that far.

AndrewT · Post by **AndrewT** » Tue May 22, 2007 8:27 pm

lukes6 wrote:I have also added bug bore shocks and done away witht the standard ones so that i can get more travel but you dont have to go that far.

What are these?

Phizinza · Post by **Phizinza** » Wed May 23, 2007 12:20 pm

Think it's just a spelling mistake. Big bore shocks external to the original shock tower is what lukes6 uses now.

AndrewT · Post by **AndrewT** » Wed May 23, 2007 3:11 pm

ah right, this is very interesting.... does anybody have any photos of such a setup?

discopotato03 · Post by **discopotato03** » Thu May 24, 2007 6:25 pm

No pics but I pulled one of these front springs out of an I think 88 Accord to compare to a std L series rear . The free length is longer with the Honda spring and they have more turns and they are a little closer together . The wire diametre is very similar at ~ 11mm , I was using a Snap On 11mm open ended spanner as a go/no go gauge and thats exactly what it did . Went oiver the Zoob spring but not quite over the Honda spring .

Correct me if I'm wrong but I suspect if you fit the Honda spring and the spring coil binds the strut goes solid and all the forces either shear off the lower spring seat or tear the top two bolt mount from the body . This would be the case I'd think if the spring coils all closed up before the bump stop had a chance to do its job . In other words no give .
The way around this would be to use a lower spring seat further down the damper body but not so far that the spring was completly unloaded and not trapped by its upper and lower seat at full suspension droop .

Cheers A .

lukes6 · Post by **lukes6** » Tue Jun 05, 2007 3:34 pm

Here are some pics of what i did so that i could use acccord springs with external shocks.

http://home.iprimus.com.au/lwillsmore/s ... bottom.jpg

http://home.iprimus.com.au/lwillsmore/s ... %20top.jpg

The standard shocks not in use and the bottom spring seats have been dropped so that they dont get torn off when the spring bottoms out.

Because the accord springs are a little longer to start with i now get a little more travel, better load holding ability and am able to use a lot better shocks.

Any questions let me know.

I definatly think this is a worth while mod if you are carrying much of a load or towing.

Subafury · Post by **Subafury** » Tue Jun 05, 2007 8:01 pm

so now u use 2 shocks in the rear- the big yellow long ones and the originals within the spring with this longer base. nice. so is there much extra lift?

lukes6 · Post by **lukes6** » Tue Jun 05, 2007 11:23 pm

Yeah i probably gained less than an inch or so in lift (Cvs seem ok with it). When i welded the seats back on to the standard shocks after tearing them off the first time, i blew holes in them so i dont use them anymore as shocks they just hold the springs. By getting rid of them i can also get more down travel too.

Suby Wan Kenobi · Post by **Suby Wan Kenobi** » Wed Jun 06, 2007 2:28 pm

Great idea you got there, i remember when i had my L wagon i could never get springs firm enough to cope with a loaded car over rough terrain but still looks like you have a bit of coil bind

lukes6 · Post by **lukes6** » Thu Jun 07, 2007 8:49 am

Yeah your right im still fine tuning.
I want to pull the standard shock out completly and put a peice of webbing in that i can adjust the length of easily so that i can work out exactly how much down travel i can get without allowing the spring to pop out.

discopotato03 · Post by **discopotato03** » Thu Jun 07, 2007 2:03 pm

Basically if you measure the springs free length it will need just a tad less to keep it "trapped" between the two seats .

I was thinking about this coilbinding business this morning and I was wondering if some sort of spacer were mounted to the pad where the rubber bump stop makes contact this may be a cheap temporary way to stop the coil bind . When I get a chance I'm going to strip a std rear height adjustable damper and see how low I can make the lower spring seat go with a few mods .

Cheers A .

Suby Wan Kenobi · Post by **Suby Wan Kenobi** » Thu Jun 07, 2007 8:27 pm

You caould always put a larger dieamoete pipe over the old strut and weld it firmly both ends then machine up and alloy clamp for the spring base and trail and error it before making a permanent welded collar. Just an idea i played with my L wagon rear the same way it worked and the final job looked neat as there was no old weld marks to be prettied up. My thing is the more factory it looks the less you are likey to be harrassed.